Assad may go as part of Syria settlement: Russia

DOHA
PLAYERS
TO PRESENT
LIPSTICK
DREAMS
VIP DINNER
MARKS
LAUNCH OF
‘DEFINITELY
ABLE’
CAMPAIGN
THE OUTFITS
THAT SAY
‘THE QUEEN’
PAGE 17 | NATION
PAGE 31 | SPORTS
PAGE 33 | CHILL OUT
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First with the news and what’s behind it
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Newsline
Villaggio fire report submitted
to Heir Apparent’s office
THE Attiyah committee probing
the fire that claimed the lives of
19 people, at the Villaggio shopping mall last week, has submitted its report to the office of HH
the Heir Apparent. The committee
is to announce its findings after
informing relatives of the victims
about the reasons and circumstances of the fire. (PG 18)
Qatar 2022 panel wins award
THE Qatar 2022 Supreme
Committee was presented an honourary award for outstanding contribution to the development of sports
in Qatar and for putting Qatar on
the world map as a booming sporting hub at the World Stadium
Awards ceremony as part of the
World Stadium Congress 2012
being held in Doha. (PG 31)
Al Meera to acquire net
assets of Omani firm
THE Al Meera Holding Company on
Tuesday said it will acquire the net
assets of Oman-based Safeer
Arabian International. Al Meera
signed an MoU to this effect with
JP Kalwani, who owns the entire
issued share capital of Safeer.
According to the MoU, Kalwani will
transfer and sell the net assets of
Safeer to Al Meera Holding. (PG 25)
New RIM OS in Qatar soon
RIM, makers of BlackBerry, plans to
introduce its latest operating system
in Qatar and the M-E soon. “We
plan to launch the BlackBerry 10
operating system in Qatar by the
year end,” RIM Director Mohammed
al Mefleh said on Monday. (PG 25)
Newsline Nationline Businessline Lifeline Sportsline
RAJAB 16, 1433
Qtel plans
to double
stake in
Asiacell
ASIF IQBAL
DOHA
QATAR Telecom (Qtel) will double its stake in Iraqi mobile operator Asiacell to 60 percent at the
cost of $1.47 billion.
“Qtel will initially increase its
ownership in Asiacell to 53.9
percent, the further increase in
shareholding is subject to Iraqi
government and regulatory
authority approval. The transaction will be financed from existing funds,” the telecom company said in a statement on
Tuesday.
Asiacell is a leading provider of
mobile
telecommunications
services in Iraq, with 9.02 million subscribers. In 2009, it
became the first mobile telecommunications provider in Iraq to
achieve nationwide coverage,
offering its services across all of
Iraq’s 18 governorates, including
the national capital.
Commenting on increasing its
stake in Asiacell, Qtel Group
Chairman Sheikh Abdullah bin
Mohammed bin Saud al Thani,
described Asiacell as an “outstanding business” that has seen
excellent performance year on
year.
“The Iraqi market is about to
enter a period of rapid broadband and data growth and
Asiacell is well positioned to
meet the demands of the population for high quality, reliable and
affordable voice and data services”, he added.
He voiced Qtel’s commitment
to reinforcing Asiacell’s position
as the leading communications
company in Iraq.
Qtel plans to invest significantly in the Asiacell and continue to work hard on preparing for
the Iraqi company’s landmark
IPO planned for later this year,
he said.
In October last year, Asiacell
appointed HSBC and Morgan
Stanley to manage an initial
public offering of its shares in
Iraq. Asiacell was awarded a 15year mobile licence in 2007, as
were Zain’s Iraq unit and
France Telecom affiliate Korek.
Asiacell paid $1.25 billion for
the licence.
Under the terms of their
licences, the three operators
were meant to launch mandatory IPOs to offload 25 percent of
their shares by the end of August
2011, but all three missed the
deadline.
The Qtel group has a significant presence in the MENA
region and Southeast Asia with
a consolidated customer base of
84 million. It operates a portfolio of brands including Qtel,
Indosat, Asiacell, Wataniya,
Nawras,
Nedjma
and
Tunisiana.
Asiacell Board Chairman
Faruk Rosool said his company
has consistently delivered strong
results and is looking forward to
more growth in the future, especially in data and broadband
services.
VOL. 6 NO. 2102
QR 2
EMIR WITH GERMAN MINISTER
The Emir His Highness Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa al Thani with Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Federal
(See also page 17)
Republic of Germany Guido Westerwelle, in Doha, on Tuesday.
Assad may go as part of
Syria settlement: Russia
AFP
DAMASCUS
RUSSIA said on Tuesday that
President Bashar al Assad could
relinquish power as part of a settlement to end bloodshed in Syria, as
Saudi Arabia called on Moscow to
end its support for the regime.
Moscow is under growing pressure to back Assad’s departure as
a first step in a peace accord that
would see his inner circle assume
command in the interim, based
on a US-backed transition this
year in Yemen.
“We have never said or insisted
that Assad necessarily had to
remain in power at the end of the
political process,” said Russia’s
Deputy
Foreign
Minister
Gennady Gatilov.
“This issue has to be settled by
the Syrians themselves,” ITARTASS news agency quoted him as
saying.
The statement was one of
Russia’s most explicit about
Assad’s position since Foreign
Minister Sergei Lavrov refused to
clearly back his rule during a visit
to Damascus in February.
It came as Moscow and Beijing,
which have stalled Western-led
moves against Damascus, began
talks on ending nearly 15 months
of violence that has killed more
than 13,500 Syrians, and cost the
lives of at least another 26 on
Tuesday.
US Secretary of State Hillary
Clinton urged both Russia and
China to be “part of the solution”
to the crisis after they agreed to
work together more closely in the
United Nations.
SEE ALSO PAGES 2 & 3 Fire at Pearl building; 39
workers rescued: MoI
The tower 21 (left) at the Viva Bahriyya section of The Pearl-Qatar, where a fire broke out at
7.30pm, in Doha, on Tuesday. (HANSON K JOSEPH)
A FIRE broke out on Tuesday
in an under-construction
building of The Pearl-Qatar
project. Civil defence personnel with the support of the
other specialised forces put
out the fire within a short
time and rescued 39 workers
trapped in the building,
according to a Ministry of
Interior (MoI) release.
The operations room of the
Ministry of Interior received a
call reporting the fire breakout
on a plot located away from
the residential and recreational areas in the ‘Viva Bahriyya’
part of The Pearl-Qatar.
Immediately, the security
agencies including Al Fazaa
(Rescue Police), firefighters
of Civil Defence, traffic
police, and search and rescue team under the Internal
Security Force rushed to the
accident site and doused
the fire in a highly profes-
sional and efficient operation.
The fire that broke out on
lower floors of the building
left workers trapped on the
upper floors .
The rescue and evacuation
operation was executed
according to the plan under
which trapped workers were
assembled on the 13th floor
for a quick and safe evacuation.
The rescue team reached
them through special mobile
escalators designed for dealing with accidents in the high
rise buildings. All the 39
trapped workers evacuated
from the building are in good
health condition.
A team has been formed
for carrying out search operation inside the building to
ensure that nobody was left
trapped in the multi-storey
building.
Firefighters try to extinguish the blaze at tower 21 at the Viva
Bahriyya section of The Pearl-Qatar, and (below) rescuers help
a person get out of the building. (PHOTO: MOI)
02
Wednesday, June 6, 2012
GULF / MIDDLE EAST
www.qatar-tribune.com
Libya takes back
Tripoli airport
from ex-rebels
Annan, Clinton to hold
Syria talks on Friday
AFP
BEIRUT/ WASHINGTON
AFP
TRIPOLI
LIBYAN authorities wrested
back control of Tripoli
International Airport from
ex-rebels who seized the
runway on Monday, surrounding
planes
and
grounding all flights after
their leader’s apparent
arrest, officials said.
It took until evening for
the authorities to regain control of the airport when loyalist forces stormed it after
negotiations with the militiamen broke down, deputy
interior minister Omar alKhadrawi told journalists.
Flights were not expected
to resume for at least 24
hours because of the damage
caused to the airport’s infrastructure. The assault by the
militiamen on the Libyan
capital’s main gateway to the
outside world underlined the
massive task facing the
authorities in reintegrating
the disparate armed groups
that took part in the overthrow of now slain dictator
Moamer Qadhafi’s regime
last year. The raid was carried out by gunmen who
fired into the air and slightly
wounded an airport employee, causing panic among
travellers, according to the
official LANA news agency.
“It is total confusion.
Everyone is fleeing,” an official at the airport said,
adding
that
several
armoured vehicles were
positioned on the tarmac
blocking traffic.
“Cars mounted with antiaircraft guns and armed men
are surrounding the aircraft
and preventing them from
moving,” another official
said, adding that some passengers were forced to leave
planes. The motive of the
gunmen was to pressure the
government to explain the
whereabouts of their leader,
Abu Ajila al Habshi. Tripoli’s
security commission, which
answers to the interior ministry, said it had nothing to
do with “the disappearance
and abduction of Colonel
Abu Ajila al Habshi.”
Libyan government forces arrive at Tripoli international airport
for talks with the Al Awfya brigade, on Monday. (AFP)
UN envoy Kofi Annan will hold
talks with US Secretary of State
Hillary Clinton in Washington
on Friday as the international
community tries to find a way
to end the bloodshed in Syria, a
US official said.
“There’s actually quite a lot
going on with Syria this week
in terms of international
efforts,” State Department
deputy spokesman Mark
Toner said on Monday, as he
dismissed a weekend speech
by Syrian President Bashar al
Assad as “out of touch with
reality.”
Clinton will attend a meeting
in Istanbul on Thursday to discuss the unrelenting violence
in Syria which has dragged on
since March 2011, and will
then meet with Annan in
Washington on Friday.
It was not yet clear whether
Annan, the UN-Arab League
envoy to Syria, would also meet
with US President Barack
Obama. Annan has demanded
a “serious review” of the deadlocked efforts to end the Syria
violence, and was also to discuss the crisis at the UN
Security Council and UN
General
Assembly
on
Thursday. “The fact of the matter is... the international community needs to come together
and unify around the idea that
a political transition must happen sooner rather than later in
Syria,”
White
House
spokesman Jay Carney said.
“We support the Annan plan
and we have even though we’ve
remained extremely skeptical,
with good reason, about
Assad’s willingness to comply
UN-Arab League special envoy Kofi Annan (left) with Swiss Foreign Minister Didier Burkhalter at the
United Nations European headquarters, in Geneva, on Tuesday. (REUTERS)
with it.”
Seeking to shore up the plan,
Clinton spoke on Monday with
Russian Foreign Minister
Sergei Lavrov “about bringing
more pressure to bear on
Assad, on the regime to comply
with all six aspects or components of the Annan plan,
including a democratic or
political transition,” Toner told
journalists.
She told her Russian counterpart that Moscow, a key ally
of Syria, had a “very significant
role to play in trying to persuade Assad, using their influence... that the Annan plan
offers the best way forward.”
Toner also said that a sanctions
group,
led
by
Washington, was to meet this
week to look at ways to “tight-
en, strengthen, better coordinate sanctions” on the Syrian
regime.
“But that’s not where we’re
stopping. We’re obviously
going to continue our work
both within the UN Security
Council and with the Friends of
the Syrian People to continue
the political and economic
pressure,” he said.
“So, you know, this is a
multi-front battle, if you will, to
keep pressure up on Assad.”
Meanwhile, in a related
development, clashes between
troops and rebels in Syria’s
western Latakia province killed
15 soldiers on Tuesday, the
Syrian Observatory for Human
Rights reported, bringing the
day’s death toll to at least 34.
“Fifteen soldiers were killed
and dozens wounded, while
three opposition fighters also
died in continuing clashes in
several villages of Al-Heffa
region in Latakia,” the
Observatory’s Rami Abdel
Rahman said. Two civilians
were also killed in the province.
The clashes took place in the
villages of Bakas, Shirkak,
Babna, Al-Jankil, and Al-Dafil
in the Al-Heffa region, while
troops stormed the town of AlHeffa itself, according to Abdel
Rahman. State news agency
SANA reported that “armed
terrorist groups attacked citizens and security forces on
Tuesday in Al-Heffa and tried
to sabotage public and private
institutions after the destruction of two ambulances used by
medics in the city.”
Crowds flock to Tahrir
to oppose Cairo verdicts
AFP
CAIRO
CROWDS of Egyptians flocked to
Cairo’s iconic Tahrir Square on Tuesday
for a mass demonstration to protest
against verdicts handed down in expresident Hosni Mubarak’s murder
trial. Marchers prepared to leave from
several mosques around the capital led
by the runners-up in last months’s presidential election first round — Hamdeen
Sabbahi, Abdel Moneim Abul Fotouh
and Khaled Ali— to join thousands
already in the square.
In Tahrir, demonstrators chanted
against the ruling military council and
vowed to keep their revolution alive.
“Revolutionaries, free, we will continue our journey,” they chanted.
Mubarak, 84, and his interior minister
Habib al Adly were sentenced to life in
prison on Saturday, but six security
chiefs were acquitted of the killings of
demonstrators during last year’s uprising that left some 850 people dead and
ousted the veteran president.
The ruling sparked nationwide outrage, with thousands taking to the
streets to vent their rage that no one had
been found directly guilty of killing the
protesters. Mubarak — the only autocrat
toppled in the Arab Spring to be put in
the dock — could have been sent to the
gallows as demanded by the prosecution
but was instead given a life term, angering many. He was also cleared of graft
charges. Along with the acquitted police
chiefs, Mubarak’s sons Alaa and Gamal
had corruption charges against them
dropped on a technicality, but they will
remain in custody pending trial on other
graft charges.
“We reject the trial. It’s a big farce,”
said Hisham Khalifa, 30, in Tahrir
Square. He said demonstrators also
wanted the dismissal of the prosecutor
general “who has ignored many corruption cases.” Demonstrators also want the
implementation of a law that would see
senior Mubarak-era figures barred from
standing for public office.
The legislation could have serious
implications for Ahmed Shafiq,
Mubarak’s last prime minister, who is
due to face the Muslim Brotherhood’s
Mohammed Mursi in a presidential
election runoff next week.Tuesday’s
protest was called by youth groups
which were a driving force against
Mubarak’s regime last year, including
the Coalition of Revolution Youth.
Egyptian held
in Cairo on
NGO trial-eve
AFP
WASHINGTON
AN Egyptian-American was
arrested in Cairo as he
returned from the US for a
hearing in the case of democracy activists accused of operating unlicensed NGOs in Egypt,
a US official confirmed on
Monday.
“Former Freedom House
employee Sherif Mansour did
return to Egypt and... was
arrested upon his arrival” late
Sunday, a State Department
spokesman, Mark Toner, said.
Tuesday marks the next
hearing in the case of the
activists, launched earlier this
year after Egypt’s military
council — which took power
following the uprising toppling
veteran leader Hosni Mubarak
— accused foreign groups of
funding street protests against
them. Egyptian authorities
brought the case against 43
defendants — 16 Egyptians and
27 foreign nationals, and at one
point barred the foreigners
from leaving the country.
After months of pressure
from Washington, 13 of the foreign defendants — including
six Americans — were allowed
to fly out of Cairo airport in
March after posting bail.
Reports said a $5 million bail
was paid for their release.
After months of
pressure from
Washington, 13 of
the foreign defendants — including
six Americans —
were allowed to fly
out of Cairo airport
in March after
posting bail.
“We continue to make very
clear our objection to what we
view as these politically-motivated trials,” Toner told journalists. He said Washington
urged “the government to stop
trying these individuals and
instead resolve any outstanding issues that they may have
on this matter in a government-to-government basis.”
Mansour, who only recently
obtained American citizenship,
said before heading back to
Cairo on Sunday that he could
not abandon those Egyptians
who had been left behind, and
accused US officials of being
too passive in the affair.
“This case is extraordinary
and it needs an extraordinary
response,” the 32-year-old
said,
quoted
by
the
Washington Post.
“They were hoping that if we
all kept a low profile, it would
fizzle away. But that’s not
acceptable for me. This is a battle that should be fought.”
The Post said that another
American, Robert Becker, 43, a
former employee of the
Washington-based National
Democratic Institute, had chosen to stay in Cairo when the
other Americans left and
would also appear at Tuesday’s
hearing.“The whole idea of
being safely ensconced in the
US while people who worked
directly for me were on trial
was unfathomable,” he said. “I
felt they were being abandoned
and I wouldn’t have been able
to live with myself.”
Jordan nabs 2 militants on way to Syria
AFP
AMMAN
JORDANIAN police have arrested
two alleged militants on their way to
Syria to fight against President
Bashar al Assad, security and
Islamist officials said on Tuesday.
It is the first time that Jordan has
publicly stated that its own militants
are joining other Arab fighters to support the Syrian opposition.
Last month, Syria said it arrested
26 alleged Al Qaeda “foreign terrorists,” including one Jordanian. But
Jordan never commented on the allegation. The Syrian uprising, which
began in March 2011 with mostly
peaceful protests calling for change,
has turned into an increasingly militarized conflict. Activists put the
death toll at over 13,000. One year
after the revolt started, the UN put
the toll at 9,000, but many more have
died since.
Al Qaeda-style suicide bombings
have become increasingly common,
and Western officials say there is little
doubt that Islamist extremists, some
associated with the terror network,
have made inroads in Syria as instability has spread.
The security official said the two
Jordanians belong to a small extremist militant organization called the
Salafi Movement. Authorities say the
group numbers 800 activists, including many who fought alongside the
al-Qaida in Iraq group.
“Salafi” is also a broader term used
by a large movement of ultraconservative Muslims, militant and other-
wise.
The official said the two were
arrested Sunday near the Syrian border, but declined to provide other
details. He insisted on anonymity,
citing the ongoing investigation.
A Salafi Movement member confirmed the arrest in a telephone interview with The Associated Press.
He identified them as Omar
Bazayaah and Khaled Khateeb, saying both were middle-aged men who
hailed from prominent tribal
Jordanian families.
He said the two confessed to police
that they were on their way to Syria to
“take part in the Jihad (holy war)
against the Syrian regime and its sinful gang.”
He insisted on anonymity, fearing
police retribution.
GULF / MIDDLE EAST
Wednesday, June 6, 2012
www.qatar-tribune.com
Maliki appeals for calm after
Baghdad blast; toll reaches 25
AFP
BAGHDAD
IRAQI leaders appealed for
calm after a suicide bomber
killed 25 people at a Shiite
foundation’s
offices
in
Baghdad, sparking fears of
sectarian strife at a time of
political crisis. The attack in
the centre of the capital on
Monday, Baghdad’s deadliest
blast in over four months, was
followed later by an explosion
near a Sunni religious foundation’s headquarters, causing no casualties.
The attacks came amid a dispute between the two Muslim
endowments which manage
Iraq’s religious landmarks over
a shrine north of Baghdad, and
during a protracted political
standoff that has raised sectarian tensions in a country
racked by brutal communal
bloodshed from 2006 to 2008.
Prime Minister Nuri al
Maliki and parliament speaker
Osama al Nujaifi both issued
condemnations of the violence
and appealed for calm, as did
UN envoy Martin Kobler.
“We call on the people to be
aware, and dismiss sectarianism and hold on to national
unity,” Maliki said, warning of
“enemies who do not want citizens to live in safety, stability
and unity.”
Monday’s first attack struck
Rescuers search for victims at the site of a bomb attack in the central Bab al Muadham area of Baghdad, Iraq, on Tuesday. (AFP)
at 11:00 am (0800 GMT) outside the Shiite endowment in
Baab al Muadham, in central
Baghdad, and left at least 25
people dead and more than 65
wounded, medical officials
said. The bombing completely
destroyed the endowment
headquarters, its deputy chief,
Sami al-Massudi, told AFP.
“We do not accuse anyone,
but we call on the Iraqi people
and especially on the sons of
our religion to bury the strife
because there is a plan to
launch a civil war between the
people, and between the Iraqi
sects,” Massudi said.
He said the Shiite endowment had received threats in
recent days because of a dispute over the Shiite Al-Askari
shrine in the mostly Sunni city
of Samarra.
The iconic gold-domed
shrine was hit by an Al Qaeda
suicide attack in February
2006 that ignited Iraq’s bloody
confessional violence.
Massudi and his aides had
produced documents that
attributed the management of
the shrine to the Shiite reli-
gious endowment, sparking
tensions with its Sunni counterpart. The attack also fell on a
significant day for Shiite
Muslims — the birthday of
Imam Ali, a cousin and son-inlaw
of
the
Prophet
Mohammed, who is a revered
figure in Shiite Islam.
AFP journalists near the site
of the attack said security
forces cordoned off the area
and barred anyone from
approaching, while emergency
workers searched for survivors
in the remains of the endowment headquarters.
Several cars and nearby
buildings were badly damaged
by the explosion, and helicopters hovered overhead.
Later on Monday, a statement on the Sunni endowment’s website said that a mortar round struck near its headquarters in Adhamiyah in
north Baghdad, but did not
cause any casualties.
The latest bloodshed comes
less than a week after a spate of
bombings in Baghdad left 17
dead on May 31, shattering a
relative calm in the city.
The spike in attacks coincides with a ratcheting up of
months-long tensions in which
several political parties have
called for the prime minister to
be unseated.
Monday’s death toll was the
highest from a single attack in
Baghdad since a suicide
bomber blew up a car outside a
hospital on January 27 killing
31 people.
Violence in Iraq has declined
dramatically since its peak in
2006-2007, but attacks
remain common, especially in
Baghdad. A total of 132 Iraqis
were killed in violence in May,
according to official figures.
Iran nominates Syria allows aid workers in 4 areas
ex-oil minister
for OPEC post
AP
GENEVA
REUTERS
DUBAI
IRAN has nominated former oil minister Gholam
Hossein Nozari as its candidate to be the next Secretary
General of OPEC, Mehr
news agency reported on
Tuesday. Nozari was Iran’s
oil
minister
during
President
Mahmoud
Ahmadinejad’s first term in
office, between 2007 and
2009.
Iraq, Saudi Arabia and
Ecuador have already nominated candidates to replace
the oil cartel’s current head
who will finish his term at
the end of this year.
Meanwhile, in a separate
development, Iran says it
will make international
complaints against 20
European companies for
failing to supply contracted
equipment for its oil refineries, Mehr news agency
reported on Tuesday. The
European Union banned all
EU companies from supplying equipment to Iran’s oil
or gas industry in 2010,
while other multinationals
have ceased dealing with
Tehran to protect their interests in the United States. “In
the last few months, some of
these foreign companies and
especially some of those
companies
holding
European licences under
contract with Iran have not
adhered to their contractual
obligations in the development of oil refineries,”
deputy oil minister Ali Reza
Zeighami said.
“Nearly 40 foreign companees have not carried out
their contractual obligations
in the plans for oil refineries,” said Zeighami, who is
also the director of the
National
Iranian
Oil
Refining and Distribution
Company (NIORDC). He
said some goods and spare
Gholam Hossein Nozari
parts that Iran’s oil refineries
need had been received
from foreign companies but
that others had still not supplied equipment as they had
agreed.
“Some of these companies
have met their obligations
through intermediaries...
Iran will make a complaint
about the other 20 foreign
companies,” Mehr quoted
him as saying. No companies were named in the
report and Zeighami gave no
details as to how or where
Iran would make its complaints. Reuters tried to contact Iranian officials for
details without success.
Inadequate refinery infrastructure and rising demand
intensified Iran’s gasoline
import dependency until
2007 - a vulnerability that
Washington and Brussels
have targeted by blocking
fuel supplies and technology
sales. International energy
companies that had hoped
to tap the country’s vast gas
reserves have pulled out
over the last few years, followed by European engineering firms such as
Technip, ABB, and Linde.
Iranian oil minister Rostam
Qasemi said companies that
had failed to meet their contractual obligations would
be excluded from Iran’s oil
and gas industry in future
and that Iran would complain to the EU about it.
SYRIA’S government has
agreed to a written deal with
the United Nations and other
international organizations
that would allow aid workers
and supplies to enter four
hard-hit provinces, UN officials announced on Tuesday.
The
agreement
with
Damascus and representatives of the government in
Geneva should allow convoys
with supplies and aid workers
from nine UN agencies and
seven other non-governmental organisations to enter
Daraa, Deir el-Zour, Homs
and Idlib within days, said
John Ging of the UN Office for
the
Coordination
of
Humanitarian Affairs.
“Whether this is a breakthrough or not will be measured in the coming weeks,”
Ging told reporters on Tuesday
in Geneva after emerging from
a closed-door session to discuss the dire humanitarian situation in Syria.
The pact with
Damascus should
allow convoys with
supplies and UN
workers to enter
Daraa, Deir el-Zour,
Homs and Idlib
Ging said the government
has pledged to grant visas and
clear up other bureaucratic
hurdles that have blocked
help from being delivered,
and he hopes to have workers
and supplies entering within
“days, not weeks.”
He said at least 1 million
Syrians are in urgent need of
some form of humanitarian
aid, including people injured
during fighting, and families
who have lost jobs or homes.
More than 78,000 Syrian
refugees were also being
helped in Iraq, Jordan,
Lebanon and Turkey, the UN
refugee agency said.
Syria barred a string of US
and European diplomats on
Tuesday, saying they were “no
longer welcome” as the country
plunged into its most profound
global isolation in decades.
Last week, Western nations
expelled Syrian diplomats in a
coordinated move over the
Houla massacre, in which
more than 100 people were
slaughtered over one weekend
in a cluster of small villages.
The UN says pro-regime
gunmen were believed to be
responsible for at least some of
the killings. President Bashar
Assad has insisted his forces
had nothing to do it.
The countries targeted by the
expulsion order have already
pulled their ambassadors from
Damascus, but the move was
symbolic of how far diplomatic
ties have disintegrated over the
course of the uprising that
began last year in March.
“Some countries have
informed our diplomatic missions and our embassies’ staff
that they are unwelcome,”
Syrian Foreign Ministry
spokesman Jihad Makdissi
said in a statement.
He said Damascus has
decided to take a “reciprocal
measure” against ambassadors
from the US, Britain, Turkey,
Switzerland, France, Italy and
Spain. A number of French,
German, Canadian, Bulgarian
and Belgian diplomats also are
affected, Makdissi said.
Syria is struggling to crush
an increasingly deadly uprising
against Assad’s rule, but the
regime’s deadly crackdown on
dissent has brought widespread condemnation.
03
Help Syrians
defend
themselves
from Assad,
says Riyadh
AFP
JEDDAH
SAUDI Foreign Minister
Prince Saud al Faisal
urged Gulf states on
Tuesday to mobilise their
resources to help Syrians
themselves”
“defend
against the President
Bashar al Assad’s regime.
Speaking at a meeting
of Gulf Cooperation
Council foreign ministers
in the Saudi port city of
Jeddah, Faisal called on
GCC countries to “to use
their resources to... enable
the Syrian people to
defend themselves against
the murderous and
destructive machine of the
government.”
He did not elaborate
but both Saudi Arabia and
Qatar have previously
called for the arming of
the Syrian rebels.
“The killing and torture of civilians has continued,” said Faisal
adding that the GCC
must find a “quick solution to this crisis.”
The Syrian pro-government daily Al Watan
accused Saudi authorities
on Monday of “plotting”
against Syria and of turning Lebanon into a springboard for attacking the
country.
The newspaper accused
the Saudi foreign minister
personally of “sending
arms to fighters and mercenaries they are financing in north Lebanon,”
where weekend clashes
between pro- and antiDamascus factions left 14
people dead.
Prince Saud also called
on GCC member states to
provide urgently needed
economic aid to Yemen,
where a year-long Arab
Spring style uprising
forced veteran leader Ali
Abdullah Saleh out of
power and plunged the
already impoverished
nation into a dire humanitarian crisis. Saudi Arabia
has already pledged $3.2
billion in financial assistance to Yemen, a commitment it made at a
Friends of Yemen meeting in Riyadh last month.
“We need to translate
our political support to
economic support to help
the government restore
stability and provide basic
aid to the Yemeni people,”
Prince Saud said.
Palestine town on Green Line bears scars of history
AFP
BARTAA
“THE Green Line? Here it is!”
jokes Yussef Kabha, drawing
an imaginary line through the
main street in Bartaa’s souk,
between a shop selling
sequined dresses and a dried
fruit stall.
The fabled Green Line is the
de facto boundary laid down in
the 1949 armistice agreement
which ended the war that
broke out when Israel declared
its independence a year earlier.
A constant point of reference
within the Israeli-Palestinian
conflict, the Green Line —
which gets its name from the
green pen used to trace its
route — is mentioned in every
international peace plan since
1993, and is considered by the
Palestinians as the starting
point for peace talks, with
negotiators referring to it as
“the pre-1967 lines.”
But in Bartaa, an Arab village
in Wadi Ara which straddles
the Green Line between Israel
and the Palestinian territories,
the invisible boundary has
been the bane of their existence
Bartaa, a village in Wadi Ara, which straddles the Green Line between Israel and the Palestinian territories.
for more than 60 years.
Though the line is not
marked, those living in the
eastern part of the village need
a permit to visit family and
friends in the west.
“That yellow house over
there? That’s my aunt’s house,”
explains Khatib Kabha, pointing through the window of his
barber shop to a building some
200 metres (yards) away —
which is on the western side of
the line. “If I go and see her
without a permit, I could be
arrested by the border police
and I risk being fined,” he says,
explaining that on a quiet day,
the border police sometimes
look the other way.
Until 1949, the village, which
is populated mostly by a family
called the Kabha clan, lived a
normal life. After the war, the
eastern side fell under
Jordanian control along with
the rest of the West Bank, while
the western half became part of
Israel. Between 1949 and 1967,
moving between the two halves
of the village was practically
impossible. But the 1967 SixDay War, when Israel captured
the West Bank, Gaza and east
Jerusalem, changed all that and
paradoxically brought about
something of a family reunion.
At the moment, Israel’s vast
separation barrier passes several kilometres to the east of the
village, further complicating
the situation for residents living
in the east of the village.
In order to go to the West
Bank, they must apply for permission from the Israeli military to cross the wall through a
gate which opens between
6:00 am and 9:00 pm.
“We don’t know who we are
any more,” complains one of
the elder members of the
Kabha clan who serves as an
intermediary between the village residents and the Israelis.
“For security, we rely on
Israel, but for the rest — health,
education — we depend on the
Palestinian Authority,” he said.
“When there is a medical
emergency during the night, I
have to call the Israelis to coordinate in order to take someone to hospital in Jenin,” he
says, referring to the nearest
Palestinian town in the northern West Bank.
04
Wednesday, June 6, 2012
EUROPE
www.qatar-tribune.com
‘Spain needs banking Clinton urges Georgia
to hold free, fair polls
union to solve crisis’
AFP
BATUMI (GEORGIA)
DPA
BRUSSELS/MADRID
SPAIN needs other euro
area partners to agree on a
banking union to get out of
its financial crisis, Finance
Minister Cristobal Montoro
said on Tuesday, but he did
not clarify whether that
would comprise direct aid
for its banks.
The banking union idea
was launched last week by
the European Commission
and the European Central
Bank. It would require all 17
euro members to jointly
underwrite bank deposits,
devise common schemes to
deal with failed banks and
agree on joint supervision.
In an interview with Onda
Cero radio, Montoro said
“the sums that the Spanish
banking sector needs to
recapitalize itself are not
very high, they are not
excessive.”
“The question is the procedure, where that money will
come from, and that is why
it is so important for
European institutions to act”
so that they can “facilitate”
the task, the minister said.
A decision in this sense
should be adopted at the
next EU summit on June 2829, he added.
A debate is ongoing on
whether the banking union
reform should include a rule
change for the European
Stability Mechanism, the
eurozone’s new bailout fund,
allowing it to directly rescue
banks without first needing
a formal bailout request by a
government.
Montoro stuck to the government’s line that Spain
“does not need” a full EU
bailout, despite acknowledging, in reference to recordhigh borrowing costs, that
“at the moment we have a
problem with access to the
markets.”
Spanish Finance Minister Cristobal Montoro
Reforms will bear fruit: Spain’s king
BRASILIA Spain’s King Juan Carlos said
Monday his nation’s economic fundamentals
were “solid” and that tough measures to firm
its footing “will not take long to bear fruit,”
during a visit to Brasilia.
“My country has the strong will and determination to overcome the crisis... The
Spanish economy’s fundamentals are strong,
our public debt is smaller than that of other
EU nations,” the monarch told Brazilian
President Dilma Rousseff and a group of
Spanish and Brazilian business leaders.
“The government has undertaken significant reforms that will not take long to bear
fruit,” he added.
The king underscored that “Spain is working with its European partners to stabilise
He also rejected suggestions that Germany was
pressing Madrid to seek outside aid. “No, that is not the
case,” he said.
US SECRETARY of State
Hillary Clinton called on
Georgia’s leaders on Tuesday
to strengthen their democracy
by ensuring that upcoming
parliamentary and presidential
elections are “free and fair”.
Clinton also reaffirmed US
support for the territorial
integrity of the former Soviet
republic that is a strong US
ally, calling on Russia to pull
back its forces from Georgia’s
breakaway regions of Abkhazia
and South Ossetia.
She delivered her message
in meetings with Prime
Minister Nika Gilauri and representatives of the country’s
opposition parties after arriving in the Black Sea port city of
Batumi late Monday from
Armenia as part of her
European tour.
President
Mikheil
Saakashvili is facing a strong
political challenge from billionaire tycoon turned opposition
leader Bidzina Ivanishvilli,
with parliamentary elections to
be held in autumn and presidential polls next year.
“We urge Georgia’s leaders
to ensure it will be a competitive campaign and that elections are free and fair both on
election day and in the weeks
and months running up to it,”
Clinton said at a session with
Georgian and US officials.
“The more difficult and ultimately the more important
work may well be ahead — the
work of building the habits and
practices that sustain democracy over time,” she added
ahead of a meeting with the
pro-US,
pro-NATO
Saakashvili.
She said the United States
“remains steadfast in our support for Georgia’s sovereignty
and territorial integrity.”
“We reject Russia’s occupation and militarisation of
Georgia’s territory and we call
upon Russia to fulfill its obligations under the 2008 ceasefire
resolution including the withdrawal of its forces to pre-conflict positions, and free access
for humanitarian assistance,”
she said.
After Georgia and Russia
fought a war in 2008, Moscow
recognised Abkhazia and
South Ossetia as independent
and permanently stationed
troops there.
The Georgian prime minister expressed gratitude for
Washington’s backing.
“Now that 20 percent of
Georgia is occupied by its
northern neighbour, Tbilisi is
convinced that the international community will not spare
any effort to help restore justice peacefully,” Gilauri said.
Clinton said the United
States would continue to help
Georgia modernise its military
and upgrade its capabilities to
defend itself and operate with
NATO forces.
She presided over the commissioning of a refurbished
Soviet-era Coast Guard
patrol boat, redesignated the
P-109, that was gutted and
re-equipped to US and
NATO specifications with US
funds.
The US plans to provide
Georgia with two refurbished
US Coast Guard cutters and is
building a ship repair depot to
maintain a growing fleet of
patrol boats.
It also has provided communications and observation
equipment, a high-tech maritime information centre and
radiation detectors deployed at
border points.
financial markets, cut public debt and bolster
the euro.”
The king also emphasised the importance
of ties with Brazil to help resolve the crisis in
Europe that has lashed Spain, weakened by
its banks.
Spain is the second-largest foreign investor
in Brazil with $85 billion poured into sectors
such as oil, telecommunications and infrastructure.
For her part, Rousseff renewed her criticisms of austerity measures that are affecting
global growth and called for “coordinated
action” to stem the crisis.
“Growth is necessary so that the measures
are not harming people, and countries,” she
added. (AFP)
What is needed is “measures that provide for more
Europe ... not measures to
rescue anyone but to bring
about a European banking
union, so that we have a
European financial system
with the same supervision,
with the same guarantees for
all,” the minister said.
Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili (left) speaks with US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, in
Batumi, on Tuesday. (AFP)
G7 conference call not sign of worsening EU crisis, says Rehn
DPA
BRUSSELS
A
CONFERENCE
call
between the Group of 7 (G7)
industrialised countries on
Tuesday is just part of “regular” exchanges, a European
Union spokesman said,
rejecting suggestions that it
was a sign of the bloc’s eco-
nomic crisis getting worse.
“I would say that this is an
exaggeration,”
Amadeu
Altafaj, spokesman for EU
Economy Commissioner Olli
Rehn, told reporters in
Brussels. “I would not
describe any of these regular
exchanges as an extraordinary, crisis, alarm, alert meeting or exchange.”
He said they typically “consist in informing our international partners about the
state of play in our crisis
response,” including efforts to
implement fiscal consolidation, bolster the banking sector and support growth.
Speculation about Spain
needing an international
bailout has been plaguing the
Altafaj said that
the European
Commission is
“always involved
in these
exchanges” and
that although Rehn
was in Riga on
Tuesday, “phones
work everywhere.”
EU in recent weeks, as the
country struggles to tackle
problems in its banking sector.
“That there is concern
about the situation in Europe,
frankly I find that completely
normal,” Altafaj said. “We are
the first to confront it. We are
not sweeping anything under
the carpet.”
The G7 encompasses the
finance
ministers
of
Britain, Canada, France,
Germany, Italy, Japan and
the
United
States.
European officials such as
Jean-Claude Juncker, the
president of the Eurogroup
panel of EU finance ministers, have also taken part in
past meetings.
Altafaj said that the
European Commission is
“always involved in these
exchanges” and that although
Rehn was in Riga on Tuesday,
“phones work everywhere.”
He declined, however, to confirm his participation.
Central bankers were also
expected to take part in
Tuesday’s call.
Tymoshenko improving: Doctors
AP
BERLIN
FORMER Ukrainian Prime
Minister Yulia Tymoshenko’s
chronic back ailment has
improved somewhat, but she
is far from cured and the conditions at a hospital in her
homeland are making treatment very difficult, German
doctors said on Tuesday.
The case of Tymoshenko,
who was sentenced to seven
years in prison for abuse of
office, has become a political
hot potato as Ukraine prepares to co-host football’s
European Championship
with Poland. France’s government says it will boycott
matches held in Ukraine
because of Tymoshenko’s
case.
Officials in Berlin have
tried to persuade Ukraine to
allow Tymoshenko to travel
to Germany for treatment.
But Karl Max Einhaeupl, the
head of Berlin’s Charite hospital, said he sees “no tendency in Ukraine to allow her
to leave” for treatment.
Lithuania’s President Dalia Grybauskaite (left) with jailed Ukrainian
leader Yulia Tymoshenko, in Kharkiv, recently. (REUTERS)
Einhaeupl and colleagues
from Charite have examined
her and supervised her treatment at a hospital in Kharkiv,
where she has been serving
her sentence, in recent
weeks.
“The medical condition has
improved — she is more
mobile, she is moving around
at least a few hours a day,”
Einhaeupl told reporters. “The
pain is a little bit less than at
the beginning of the treatment, but it’s not gone at all.”
Tymoshenko’s deep distrust of Ukrainian officials
and government-appointed
doctors hasn’t helped and
was fed, for example, by an
incident in which her medical
records were shown on television, he said.
Her treatment at the hospital is “under constant surveillance, by video cameras and
by guards,” he added.
The German doctors insisted on the cameras being
taped over during visits, but
Tymoshenko fears that there
may be more, hidden cameras. Doctors also pressed for
authorities to uncover one
hospital room’s windows for
a short time each day and
allow in daylight.
“I think I can say that ...
Mrs. Tymoshenko has great
trust in the doctors from
Germany, but we are never
alone with her — there is
always someone there,” not
least a second patient in
the same room, Einhaeupl
said.
“It is proving to be very difficult and, in the end, it is
impossible
to
predict
whether, under these conditions, we can really bring
about a cure,” he said.
Einhaeupl
said
Tymoshenko has raised the
possibility of being transferred to Kiev, which the
German doctors would welcome as it would make it easier for them to travel to treat
her. Putting Tymoshenko
under house arrest also
would make matters easier,
he added.
Wednesday, June 6, 2012
UNITED KINGDOM
www.qatar-tribune.com
Queen wraps up 4-day jubilee
festivities without Philip
AFP
LONDON
BRITAIN’S Queen Elizabeth II
on Tuesday wraps up four
days of diamond jubilee celebrations but without her husband Prince Philip after he was
hospitalised with a bladder
infection.
The festivities conclude with
a ceremonial carriage procession in London, a formal contrast to Monday’s spectacular
pop tribute staged outside
Buckingham Palace.
Prince Philip, who turns 91
on Sunday and has been at
the queen’s side throughout
her 60-year reign, missed the
musical extravaganza and
will remain in hospital for
several days.
Buckingham Palace said
Philip, the longest-serving
royal consort in British history, was “disappointed” to miss
the concert as well as
Tuesday’s thanksgiving service
at St Paul’s Cathedral and carriage procession.
The new health scare comes
less than six months after the
outspoken British royal patriarch suffered chest pains during the Christmas break and
was treated for a blocked coronary artery.
Queen Elizabeth (left) with Duchess of Cornwall Camilla (right), and Prince Charles at Westminster
House, in London, on Tuesday. (REUTERS)
Prince Philip appeared in
good health on Sunday as he
travelled on the royal barge in
chilly conditions during a
1,000-boat river pageant for
the jubilee.
But he was absent as the
queen and several other members of the royal family attended Monday’s colourful concert
featuring a raft of top pop stars
and watched by hundreds of
thousands of patriotic revellers.
The British press praised the
queen’s “brave” decision to
attend the concert despite her
husband’s ill health, with the
Daily Telegraph, Daily Mail
and Daily Express all carrying
the headline: “The show must
go on.”
Tuesday marks a return to
pomp and pageantry as the
queen attends a thanksgiving
service at St Paul’s before
returning to the palace in a
carriage procession down The
Mall.
The monarch, Prince
Charles, Prince Harry, Prince
William and his wife Catherine
will then appear on the
Buckingham Palace balcony
for a Royal Air Force flypast.
Broadcasters across the
REUTERS
LONDON
BRITAIN needs separate
accounting rules for banks to
allow investors and regulators to properly evaluate
risks, as trying to do so now
was like trying to “pin the tail
on a boisterous donkey”, a
senior Bank of England official said.
International
Financial
Reporting Standards (IFRS),
which
set
accounting
methodology, give a “hit and
miss” view of the solvency of
banks, Andrew Haldane
wrote in this month’s edition
of the accountancy and business magazine Economia.
Haldane, the Bank’s executive director for financial stability, said Britain’s accounting rules were so badly flawed
that getting an accurate view
of a bank’s assets was like trying to “pin the tail on a bois-
Younger of royals
being groomed,
says queen
Commonwealth will air a twominute message of thanks
from the queen, recorded
before Monday’s concert, at
1700 GMT.
The palace underwent an
unprecedented makeover on
Monday when it was turned
into a giant screen, providing a
spectacular backdrop for performances from some of pop
music’s biggest stars.
inger Robbie Williams
kicked off the gala event and
was followed by acts from
throughout the queen’s 60year reign including ex-Beatle
Paul McCartney, Elton John,
Kylie Minogue and Stevie
Wonder.
The monarch appeared on
stage after the final set to light
a ceremonial beacon, the centrepiece of a chain of 4,200
spanning the Commonwealth,
triggering a thunderous firework finale.
Moments earlier, her son and
heir Prince Charles took centre
stage to celebrate the “life and
service of a very special person”, drawing cheers from the
crowd as he paid tribute to his
“mummy”. Despite the informal good spirit of the occasion,
the prince expressed regret
over the absence of Prince
Philip.
Britain needs new accounting rules for bank, regulators
terous donkey”.
He said the uncertainty
brought about by the financial
crisis showed that the “flighty
liabilities and uncertain
assets” of banks made for a
fragile mix.
AFP
LONDON
BRITAIN’S
Queen
Elizabeth II has said she
will never abdicate, but
after the diamond jubilee
there are signs that the
younger royals will take on
a growing number of roles
for the 86-year-old,
experts say.
The nationwide celebrations marking her 60th
year on the throne have
boosted the popularity of
the monarch and the rest
of the royal family to their
highest level for decades,
after a difficult time in the
1990s.
The queen herself
appeared indefatigable as
she headed a 1,000-boat
flotilla on the River
Thames, with every sign
that she will beat the
empress-queen Victoria’s
record for the longest reign
in 2015.
“The Queen will never
abdicate, she said very
clearly on a number of
occasions that she will not
abdicate,” royal historian
Kate Williams told AFP.
“And if she gets something like Alzheimer’s or a
very severe disease she will
not abdicate then, Charles
will be regent until she actually dies,” Williams added.
Her children and grandchildren are increasingly
shouldering some of the
burden of the gruelling official schedule of Elizabeth
and her 90-year-old husband Prince Philip, particu-
larly on trips abroad.
Heir to the throne Prince
Charles, 63, has been playing a big role for years, but
his sons William, 29, and
Harry, 27, have taken on a
far greater royal role in the
past year since the wedding
of William to Kate
Middleton in April 2011.
“The institution of
monarchy relies upon a
wider family. It’s not a pres-
The queen has
already started
scaling down the
number of official duties she
performs, from
432 in 2010 to
370 in 2011.
idential system, it’s not a
one person operation.
There is a triangle at the top
of the tree.”
The queen has already
started scaling down the
number of official duties
she performs, from 432 in
2010 to 370 in 2011.
All foreign trips to
Commonwealth countries
during the jubilee year
have been left to the
younger royals, with
William and Harry representing the queen abroad
for the first time, and the
queen’s children Charles,
Anne, Andrew and Edward
all taking part.
The queen and Prince
Philip — who suffered a
heart attack in December
— have restricted themselves to a tour of the
United Kingdom.
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Indonesia
coal group
warns govt
over hasty
policy moves
REUTERS
NUSA DUA
INDONESIA should avoid
hasty policy announcements
on coal that are hurting miners and fuelling perceptions
of investment risk in the
world’s top thermal coal
exporter, an industry group
said on Tuesday.
The
government
on
Monday said it was looking to
impose controls on the industry in a bid to increase domestic revenue and better manage its natural resources. It
also said an export tax on coal
remains under consideration.
Those comments drove
down shares in the country’s
top coal miners Bumi
Resources and Adaro Energy
by over 13 percent, versus a
4.3 percent drop in the broader Jakarta Index.
“Drafting is okay, but not
speaking
in
public,”
Indonesian Coal Mining
Association chairman Bob
Kamandanu said on the sidelines of the Coaltrans conference in Bali.
Southeast Asia’s largest
economy has introduced a
series of regulations aimed at
squeezing extra state revenue
from the mining industry,
including limiting foreign
ownership and a 20 percent
tax on exports of unprocessed
minerals.
But the government has so
far steered clear of coal
exports, worth $27 billion last
year, or 13 percent of the
country’s total.
No comprehensive details
of regulations on coal have
been released, but comments
from officials since December
indicate these could include
increasing royalties, introducing an export tax and
imposing divestment and
domestic market obligations
on mining license holders.
In a straw poll of mostly
coal producers at the conference, 55 percent of around
400 respondents said they
expect the government to
implement an export tax on
coal.
“The government has put
the brakes on everyone,” said
Fadjar Kandar, a partner at
Jakarta-based law firm
Soemadipradja & Taher,
which specialises in advocacy
for mining companies.
“Investment will definitely
be slowing down.”
Financial advisor Hadyn
Palliser, an associate at
Corality Financial Group
(Australia), also warned that
the government must be
clearer in making regulatory
announcements. “A lot of our
clients are private equity
firms and they are particularly concerned about coming in
without knowing what they
are going to get hold of, what
ownership they will have in a
company, what are the ways
they can structure a transaction,” Palliser said.
Some cautioned investors
against over-reacting.
“Everyone’s got their hands
thrown up saying this is the
death of the mining industry,”
said Edward Gustely, managing director of Penida capital
advisors and a senior advisor
to the Finance Ministry.
A coal barge carries Adaro Energy’s coal on the Barito river, in
South Kalimantan province, Indonesia, recently. (REUTERS)
PHILIPPINES / EAST ASIA
BUDDHIST VESAK DAY
Devotees meditate during a ceremony on Vesak Day, an annual celebration of Buddha’s birth, enlightenment and death, at the Wat Phra Dhammakaya temple, in
Pathum Thani province, Bangkok, on Monday. This year marks the 2600th anniversary of Buddha’s enlightenment. (REUTERS)
Tensions with China over
shoal on the ease: Manila
AFP & DPA
MANILA
CHINA and the Philippines
have repositioned some
ships stationed at a disputed
South China Sea shoal, easing tensions that have been
building up since April, the
Philippine government said
on Tuesday.
Following bilateral consultations, China moved out
two government ships from
a lagoon at the centre of the
rock
formation
called
Scarborough Shoal, and a
Philippine fisheries bureau
vessel did the same, the foreign department said.
It is not clear when the
consultations took place nor
when the three vessels
manoeuvred to their current
positions.
Two Chinese vessels
joined six other Chinese
ships just outside the
lagoon, while the Philippine
vessel was now with a second Philippine ship stationed outside, added foreign department spokesman
Raul Hernandez.
The coordinated pullback
was a step in the right direction, President Benigno
The coordinated
pullback was a
step in the right
direction. This is
an easing of tensions and we
appreciate the gesture of both parties to de-escalate
tension in Scarborough Shoal.
EDWIN LACIERDA
‘The disputed area’
Aquino’s spokesman Edwin
Lacierda said.
“This is an easing of tensions and we appreciate the
gesture of both parties to deescalate
tension
in
Scarborough
Shoal,”
Lacierda said.
“We continue the consultations to address the
remaining issues in Bajo de
Masinloc,” the department
added, referring to the shoal
by its Philippine name.
The Philippines has also
recalled a Bureau of
Fisheries ship that was dispatched to replace a navy
ship during the stand-off
and to monitor Chinese fishing activities in the lagoon.
“Outside the lagoon, there
are eight Chinese government
ships and two Philippine government ships,” he added.
Hernandez said the reciprocal pullback left 30
Chinese fishing boats in the
lagoon, adding there were
no Filipino fishermen in the
area.
Chinese and Philippine
government ships have been
facing off around the
Scarborough Shoal. The
conflict began on April 10
when the two Chinese maritime
ships
blocked
Philippine navy personnel
from arresting the crew of
eight Chinese fishing boats
for alleged poaching.
The Philippines claims the
shoal, which lies near the
main Philippine island of
Luzon, falls within its exclusive economic zone while
China claims it, along with
nearly all of the South China
Sea up to the coasts of Asian
neighbours.
The shoal is 230 kilometres west of the Philippines’
province of Zambales and
870 kilometres from the
nearest coast of China in
Hainan province.
China claims nearly the
entire South China Sea,
which straddles key shipping lanes in the region and
is believed to be rich in
resources.
The Philippines and
China are continuing consultations to address the
maritime dispute, he added.
The Philippines, Malaysia,
Vietnam, Brunei and Taiwan
also have overlapping claims
in the sea.
The Philippines has long
urged the international community to take a stand on
the dispute, warning that
China’s claim could be a
potential threat to freedom
of navigation and unimpeded commerce.
Cambodian PM’s party triumphs in election test run
REUTERS
PHNOM PENH
Supporters of Cambodian People’s Party carry a portrait of Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen during
a campaign for the Cambodian local council elections, in Phnom Penh, recently. (EPA)
CAMBODIA’S ruling party
looks to have won a landslide
win in local elections, putting
authoritarian Prime Minister
Hun Sen on course to remain
one of the world’s longestserving leaders after parliamentary elections next year.
Official
results
from
Sunday’s elections for the
chiefs of areas known as communes are not expected for
several weeks but the major
parties were in agreement
that Hun Sen’s Cambodian
People’s Party (CPP) had
swept the polls, as it has in all
national ballots in the past
decade.
The CPP claimed 72 percent of the seats in what it
sees as a test of support
ahead of the 2013 election.
General elections take place
every five years.
“These results show a landslide victory,” top CPP member of parliament Cheam
Yeap told Reuters. “This is a
basic projection for the parliamentary election in the
middle of next year.”
Hun Sen, a former Khmer
Rogue soldier who defected to
eventual invaders Vietnam
during the Khmer Rouge’s
1975-1979 reign of terror, has
been in power for 27 of his 59
years and has said he plans to
remain there until he dies.
The CPP claimed
72 percent of the
seats in what it
sees as a test of
support ahead of
the 2013 election.
General elections
take place every
five years.
A shrewd political tactician
with an image as a toughtalking strongman, Hun Sen’s
supporters say he is popular
among the millions of rural
poor,
having
overseen
unprecedented growth, stability and development since
the decades of war that
turned the former French
colony into a failed state.
Critics say Hun Sen is a
ruthless leader who has
intimidated his opponents
into submission or frightened
them out of the country.
The latest polls did throw
up some signs of discontent,
with the CPP’s notable loss of
seats in areas that have seen
long-running land disputes
and forced evictions from
land leased to foreign companies. The government suspended new land concessions
to foreign firms in May.
The main opposition Sam
Rainsy Party said early indications
from
monitors
showed it took just 21 percent
of the seats but it said there
were
irregularities
in
Sunday’s vote.
Its self-exiled leader, Sam
Rainsy, who fled Cambodia
after being sentenced to 12
years for forgery and destruction of property, among other
crimes, says the 2013 vote will
be a sham unless he is
allowed to take part without
serving jail time.
Philippines
asks rebels to
memorialise
war horrors
AP
MANILA
PHILIPPINE negotiators
hoping to end a Muslim
insurgency have proposed
creating monuments to
abuses committed on
both sides.
The monuments should
help tell the full story of the
decades-long
Muslim
rebellion in the country’s
south and remind future
generations of the brutality
and blunders that helped
perpetuate the violence,
chief government negotiator Marvic Leonen said.
“We have seen that
future generations would
not move on and heal
unless we really tell the
story,” Leonen said.
Rebel
negotiator
Mohagher Iqbal said the
proposal was acceptable,
but that the government
should first focus on
resolving the rebellion,
which has caused massive
deaths and displacement
of villagers, while stunting
economic growth in the
resource-rich region.
The Philippine government and the 11,000strong Moro Islamic
Liberation Front remain
optimistic a peace pact
can be reached under
reformist
President
Benigno Aquino III’s term
despite key differences
that
have
stalled
Malaysian-brokered
negotiations.
Those
differences
include the size of an
expanded
Muslim
autonomous region in the
southern Mindanao region
and the powers to be
accorded to Muslim officials, who would run it.
Leonen also said a marker should be installed on
southern Basilan island,
where the guerrillas were
accused of beheading 10
Filipino marines during a
2007 clash.
Philippine officials said
they were mulling whether
to ask the National
Historical Institute to start
studying where the monuments and markers could
be installed in what could
be a joint project by the
government and the
rebels, Deles said, adding
that versions by both sides
would be considered in
portraying violent events.
Wednesday, June 6, 2012
SOUTH ASIA
www.qatar-tribune.com
07
Karzai to sign strategic deal with China
DPA
KABUL
AFGHAN President Hamid
Karzai travelled to China on
Tuesday to attend the 12th
summit of the Shanghai
Cooperation Organisation,
his office said.
Afghanistan is expected to
sign an agreement to establish a
strategic partnership with
China, according to the statement. The Afghan president is
heading a high-level team comprising foreign, mining, agriculture and security ministers.
The pact would deepen
Chinese role in Afghanistan as
Western countries prepare to
halt combat operations. Until
now, China has only invested
in the mining sector, and kept
out of political and security
issues in the war-torn country.
Afghanistan has signed
strategic partnership agreements with many Western
nations including the United
States, Germany and Australia.
An agricultural cooperation
agreement with Beijing is also
expected to be inked, according
to the statement.
It said Karzai is also scheduled to hold separate meeting
with the presidents of China,
Russia, Pakistan and Iran to
discuss regional peace and
stability issues.
Karzai is accompanied by
his foreign minister, the mining and the agricultural ministers and the national security advisor among others, the
statement said.
Afghanistan’s decade-old
insurgency is one of the priorities at the summit due to
start on Wednesday.
Last year, the country
became an observer state in
the Shanghai Cooperation
Organization, an intergovernmental security group founded
in 2001 by China, Kazakhstan,
Kyrgyzstan, Russia, Tajikistan,
and Uzbekistan.
Meanwhile, three foreign
militants were killed by a
NATO airstrike early Tuesday
in eastern Afghanistan, an
official said.
“We were informed that
some Arab insurgents had
entered a village in Sayed
Abad district of Wardak
province for terrorist activities.
We shared the information
with the NATO forces and they
raided the area,” provincial
governor’s
spokesman
Shahidullah Shaheed said.
He said Afghan security
forces seized some weapons and
explosives in the area. It was not
clear yet how many foreign
insurgents were in the area.
Arab fighters with Al Qaeda
related groups fight alongside
Bangladesh aims
for 7.2% GDP
growth this year
REUTERS
DHAKA
BANGLADESH is aiming to
boost economic growth to
7.2 percent economic growth
in the year to June 2013, up
from an estimated 6.32 percent in the current year,
despite challenges such as
soaring fuel prices and
record inflation, Finance
Minister Abul Maal Abdul
Muhith said on Tuesday.
“It (6.32 percent) is a primary estimation, but I am
fully confident that at the
end of the day when we get
all facts and figures (in
hand) the growth will be at
least 6.7 percent,” Muhith
told Reuters in an interview.
Bangladesh had set a target of 7.0 percent economic
growth for the current fiscal
year.
The main driver
of growth in the
next fiscal year
beginning on July
1 will be expected higher income
from exports,
especially of
ready-made garments, and
increased remittances from
migrant workers.
Muhith will present next
year’s budget in parliament
on June 7, amid widespread
criticism over its financial
management and lacklustre
investment flows.
“The budget for 2012/13
fiscal year will aim at boosting growth, curbing inflation and creating more
jobs,” the minister said.
The main driver of
growth in the next fiscal
year beginning on July 1
will be expected higher
income from exports, especially of ready-made garments, and increased
remittances from migrant
workers, said Muhith.
“We (also) expect higher
growth in the next fiscal
year because of a strong
farming sector, more earning by expatriates and also
vibrant non-farm economic
activities in rural areas.”
The rice crop for the
year to this June rose to a
record of about 35 million
tonnes from the previous
year’s 34.25 million
tonnes thanks to government efforts to improve
productivity.
Inflation remained elevated in the double digits
through most of 2011/12,
but the government has
pledged to bring it lower in
during the new budget
year.
The minister indicated
that the size of the new
budget might be 1.9 trillion
taka, against 1.6 trillion
taka for 2011/12, with bigger allocations for infrastructure, health, education, power and the rural
economy.
“The overall inflation rate
in the coming fiscal year is
expected to 7.5 percent,
against 7.0 percent targeted
for 2011/12, that was later
revised up to 7.5 percent,”
said Muhith.
In 2011/12, inflation
peaked at 11.97 percent in
September, largely driven
by large imports of fuel oil
at high prices, officials said.
Muhith said annual development spending during the
next year would be 543 billion taka including 215 billion taka from foreign loan.
This is 83 billion taka more
than the present one.
He expressed his dissatisfaction over the poor level
of disbursement of foreign
assistance, both in the form
of loans and aid.
“The share of foreign aid
to the economy in the current (2011/12) fiscal year
was around 0.6 percent,
which should be, at least,
3.0 percent of GDP,”
Muhith observed.
“We are not capable
enough to utilise external
aid,” the minister lamented.
He also said the subsidy
bill on petroleum products,
power and state-owned
enterprises would decline
to a marked extent in the
next budget.
Muhith said the government might waive duty on
import of capital machinery
for 100 percent export-oriented industries to encourage investment.
Taliban insurgents against
the Afghan government and
international forces.
“We are aware of the report
that three Arab militants were
killed by NATO airstrike.
Unfortunately, at this time,
the operational reporting can
neither confirm nor deny the
report,” NATO spokesman
Major Martyn Crighton said.
Taliban officials were not
available for comment.
Chinese state media quoted
Sun Zhuangzhi, a Central
Asian expert at the Chinese
Academy of Social Sciences,
as saying Afghanistan’s
increasing
participation
would strengthen the group’s
campaigns against drug-trafficking and terrorism.
The bloc was founded in
2001 to enhance security cooperation between its six member
states of China, Kazakhstan,
Kyrgyzstan, Russia, Tajikistan
and Uzbekistan.
It has since expanded its
discussions to cover economic, technological, cultural and
other forms of cooperation.
India, Iran, Pakistan and
Mongolia are permanent
observers to the group, while
Belarus and Sri Lanka
became dialogue partners in
2010. Afghanistan would be
the first new observer nation
since 2005.
Liberal blogger
stabbed in
Maldives
AFP
COLOMBO
AN outspoken Maldivian
blogger known for his liberal
views on religion was in
intensive care on Tuesday
after being stabbed by an
attacker outside his home in
the capital Male, police said.
Ismail Rasheed, who is better known as “Hilath”, had his
blog blocked late last year by
the Maldivian telecommunications authorities who
claimed it contained antiIslamic material.
The 37-year-old, who has
received death threats in the
past, was later arrested following a rally he organised in
December in support of religious tolerance and spent
nearly a month behind bars.
“We don’t know who
attacked him. His condition is
said to be stable now,” police
spokesman Hassan Haneef
told AFP by telephone,
adding that they were trying
to track down the assailant
behind Monday evening’s
attack.
The Maldivian government
condemned the stabbing, but
said Hilath should have
sought protection.
Afghanistan’s President Hamid Karzai (left) at Beijing’s international airport, on Tuesday. (AFP)
16 arrested over Afghan
‘poisoning’ of schoolgirl
AFP
KABUL
SIXTEEN people have been
arrested over the alleged serial poisoning of schoolgirls in
Afghanistan, although some
doctors now suspect psychological stress could be behind
the “attacks”, officials said on
Tuesday.
The sweeping arrests come
as desperate authorities try to
put an end to the mysterious
illnesses — usually mass fainting episodes — that have struck
scores of schoolgirls in northern Takhar province almost
daily for the past two weeks.
Among those held are
Pakistani woman working in a
clinic and a Taliban insurgent
leader, provincial spokesman
Mostafa Rasuli said. All have
denied any involvement, and
no proof of poisoning has been
found, he said.
An expert in the field is convinced that the incidents are
classic examples of mass psychogenic illness, or mass hysteria, rather than poisoning.
Some doctors in the area
now share this belief, an edu-
Afghan school girls receive first-aid after inhaling some mysterious poisonous gas, in Takhar,
Afghanistan, recently. (EPA)
cation ministry spokesman,
Abdul Saboor Ghufrani, said
on Tuesday — a day when 60
schoolgirls in two separate
schools were affected.
“There have been a number
of suspected poisoning cases
of schoolgirls in Takhar
province recently, but initial
investigation by health and
security teams in the area
have failed to detect traces of
any poison,” Ghufrani said.
“In some cases doctors in
the area have reported they
suspect a psychological cause
behind these incidents, but
we cannot yet definitely rule
out the possibility of deliberate attempt by some group to
sicken our students.
“Some suspects have been
detained in recent days and
police are interrogating them.
We have to wait for the outcome of the investigation.”
Local officials regularly
accuse Taliban insurgents,
who banned schooling for
girls while in power from 1996
to 2001, of poisoning school
wells or using “gas” or “toxic
powder” against the girls.
Myanmar president, Suu Kyi urged to push reforms
AFP
YANGON
Myanmar opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi at Yangon’s international airport after her trip to Thailand, on Sunday. (AFP)
MYANMAR’S state media
hailed Aung San Suu Kyi on
Monday as “the hope of
Myanmar” and a leader
alongside the president in a
rare tribute to the democracy
icon that urged the pair to
“cooperate”.
In an article entitled “To the
leaders who are the hope of
Myanmar”, state mouthpiece
the New Light of Myanmar
said the future of the fastreforming nation “depends
completely” on Suu Kyi and
President Thein Sein working
together.
“Realising that the future of
our people depends on the
two leaders, president and
Daw Aung Suu Kyi, they
should cooperate based on
mutual trust and understanding,” the article said.
But it urged them not to
jeopardise a potential economic boom as the country
opens up and to set aside
“egoism and selfishness”.
Suu Kyi, who with Thein
Sein was referred to as
“visionary”, was afforded an
unprecedented amount of
print space in the newspaper,
which has given only muted
coverage to the opposition
leader since her release from
house arrest days after a controversial 2010 election.
The Nobel laureate, who
was elected to parliament in
April by-elections, returned
to Myanmar on Sunday after
travelling abroad for the first
time in 24 years on a visit to
Thailand that included
addressing world business
leaders in Bangkok and visiting Myanmar communities.
Suu Kyi had previously
refused to leave Myanmar
because of fears the previous junta would not allow
her to return.
Her decision to travel overseas is seen as a key sign of confidence in changes that have
swept the country under a new
quasi-civilian government.
But Thein Sein’s unexplained cancellation of an
official visit to Thailand during the same week raised concerns of a rift.
Addressing the Bangkok
forum on Friday, Suu Kyi
urged “healthy scepticism”
over Myanmar’s dramatic
reforms, saying only the rule
of law can cement recent
political progress and foster
clean investment.
The New Light author said he
was “relieved” that Suu Kyi’s
focus on job-creating industries
in her speech at the World
Economic Forum on East Asia
echoed the priorities of Energy
Minister Than Htay, who represented Thein Sein at the event.
But the article raised concerns that Suu Kyi’s comments
about Myanmar’s legal system
and her exhortation to delegates
not to be overly optimistic about
the country’s progress, would
“shut the door on purpose.”
08
Wednesday, June 6, 2012
OPINION
www.qatar-tribune.com
ESTABLISHED SEPTEMBER
3, 2006
HAMAD BIN SUHAIM AL THANI
ADEL ALI BIN ALI
DR HASSAN MOHAMMED AL ANSARI
EDITOR -IN-CHIEF
AJIT KUMAR JHA
CHAIRMAN
MANAGING DIRECTOR
EDITOR
Clinton In Caucasus
America should engage with Georgia & Russia to prevent terrorism & war in the region
PRINTED AT ALI BIN ALI PRINTING PRESS
Westside
Doping Scandal
Regulators should rid horse racing industry of corruption
T
HE horse racing industry should be
deeply shamed that extraordinary security measures had to be ordered to guard
horses in next Saturday’s Belmont Stakes
from the doping abuses engulfing thoroughbred racing. The horses will be kept
in an isolated barn with visitors limited,
feed and hay bales checked for drugs, and
veterinarians and trainers under daily
watch to ensure there is no manipulation
of food or medication.
If anyone thinks this is an overreaction,
they should take a look
at the record of Doug
O’Neill. He is the trainer
of I’ll Have Another, the
horse primed for the
chance to be a Triple
Crown champion after
winning the Kentucky
Derby
and
the
Preakness
Stakes.
O’Neill has a long history of racing sanctions
and
penalties
for
administering illegal
and dangerous performance-enhancing
concoctions. For all the
pageantry
of
the
Belmont, the race
should be heard by the industry as a blaring call to reform its practices with more
forceful anti-doping measures and penalties, including a lifetime ban on trainers
who are multiple offenders.
Andrew Cuomo last month replaced the
quasipublic New York Racing Association
with a special panel of appointees directed
to put into place stronger anticorruption
protections. Racing in other states suffers
similar mismanagement, and they must
either join to enact effective reform or face
the prospect of federal
control of the racing
industry.
O’Neill denies ever
doping racehorses. But
late last month he
received a 45-day suspension by California’s
racing association for
using an enhancer to
improve a horse’s performance.
The regulators’ commitment to clean racing
has clear and cynical
limits: they also postponed O’Neill’s suspension until after the
Belmont Stakes.
Eastside
An Honourable Campaign
Volunteers’ action to help workers reflects badly on Saudi companies
I
T ought to be a matter of considerable
pride that young Saudi volunteers have
taken it upon themselves to give bottles of
chilled water and fruit juice to workers
laboring out in the sun in parks and on
road and construction sites. This is a
demonstration of caring and consideration which demonstrates Saudi youth at
its very best.
Unfortunately, what these young people are doing is also a cause for shame
and indeed outrage. Put bluntly, it ought
not to be necessary for these well-motivated individuals to be doing their cooldrink runs at all. It is the responsibility of
the organisations that employ these
workers to look after their welfare.
Yet as one of the volunteer drink
providers told Arab News this week, it
appears that the majority of employers,
most from municipalities and construc-
tion companies, is simply not bothering
to ensure that these expatriate workers
are given refreshment and are protected
from the very real dangers of dehydration.
The majority of this water is recycled
from human effluent and while it may be
fit for gardening and building, is dangerous for human consumption.
So, therefore, not only do many of these
unfortunate labourers often lack proper
drinking water but that which they have
to hand could very well be carrying infections and diseases which will damage
their own health, and if they prove contagious, the health of society as a whole.
As the students have said themselves in
their social media messages that appear
to have turned this drink-provision service into a viral movement, this is indeed
“an honourable campaign”.
S
ECRETARY of State Hillary
Clinton’s visit to Armenia,
Azerbaijan, and Georgia this
week is timely. The Caucasus
holds risks of confrontation that
could affect American and European
interests, and it requires regular and
high-level attention.
Terrorism and insurgency are
spreading in Russia’s North Caucasus
region. Russian military occupation of
Abkhazia, South Ossetia, and adjacent
areas in Georgia heightens strains.
Renewed hostilities are increasingly
possible between Armenia and
Azerbaijan over the ethnic Armenian
enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh in
Azerbaijan.
Vladimir Putin’s return to Russia’s
presidency adds complexity. He seeks
to increase Russia’s influence over former Soviet neighbours, counterbalancing the appeal of the NATO and the
European Union. Last month, Putin
skipped a G-8 summit but convened
leaders from the Collective Security
Treaty Organisation, whose other
members are Armenia, Belarus,
Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan
and Uzbekistan. Russia is pushing for a
widened Eurasian customs union,
which Ukraine is resisting.
The Kremlin is sceptical about democratic openings on its borders, such as
the 2003 Rose revolution in Georgia
and the one a year later in Ukraine.
Russia’s invasion of Georgia in 2008
violated established precedent in seeking to change by force borders of the
former Soviet states. Moscow engineered proclamations of independence
by Abkhazia and South Ossetia, but
they are effectively being integrated
into Russia.
Although last year Georgia agreed to
allow Russia to join the World Trade
Organisation, relationships remain
tenuous. The Kremlin refuses to deal
with President Mikheil Saakashvili,
and most economic ties are suspended.
Last month in Chicago, despite
Moscow’s opposition, NATO reaffirmed that Georgia will become a
member and noted its ‘’substantial contribution’’ – including in Afghanistan –
to Euro-Atlantic security. Georgia’s
holding of free and fair parliamentary
elections this year and presidential
elections in 2013 will influence NATO
attitudes about membership.
War over Nagorno-Karabakh in the
early 1990s displaced about a million
people and gave Armenia control of the
enclave and another 9 percent of
Azerbaijan’s
territory.
The
Organisation for Security and
Cooperation in Europe seeks a mediated solution, but negotiations are long
stalled. A fragile cease-fire is frequently
violated. Russia arms Armenia and
maintains a military base there.
Azerbaijan uses its oil wealth for an
arms buildup, and its ally Turkey has
closed the border with Armenia for
more than a decade. The NagornoKarabakh conflict could suddenly
become unfrozen.
In the North Caucasus, popular
DENIS CORBOY, WILLIAM COURTNEY AND KENNETH YALOWITZ | NYT NEWS SERVICE
alienation and militant violence are
increasing. Two dozen Russian soldiers
died in an attack three days before
Putin’s inauguration last month.
Russia relies mostly on force and economic subsidies to quell resistance, but
the strategy has not worked. Terrorism
could be a real threat to the 2014
Winter Olympic games in Sochi.
Terrorism and
insurgency are
spreading in Russia’s
North Caucasus
region. Russian
military occupation
of Abkhazia, South
Ossetia, and adjacent
areas in Georgia
heightens strains.
Moscow might again blame Azerbaijan
and Georgia for aiding terrorists, as it
did falsely in 1999 regarding Chechnya.
How can the America and Europe
lessen risks in the Caucasus?
They should continue to stand firm
for the independence of Georgia and
against the illegal occupation of onefifth of its territory. Moscow ought not
to be allowed to assert control over the
export of Caspian energy through
Georgia. Europe and America should
importune Georgia not to stir antiRussian animosities in the North
Caucasus. They ought to cooperate
with Russia to prevent terrorist acts
around the Olympics.
America and Europe can no longer
keep the Nagorno-Karabakh talks on
the back burner. Azerbaijani President
Ilham Aliyev faces domestic pressures
to act, but Europe and America should
caution him about the adverse consequences, notably a broader regional
war. Energy investment in Azerbaijan
and a major new gas pipeline to
Europe, Nabucco, could become casualties.
OSCE members have largely stopped
engaging Russia about tensions in the
North Caucasus, but risks grow and
could spill over into Azerbaijan and
Georgia. Members should use the permanent council in Vienna to raise concerns and begin a dialogue.
In her visit, Secretary Clinton
should spotlight these tensions and
offer reassurance that the West will
work actively to prevent confrontation
and conflict.
Denis Corboy, a visiting senior
research fellow at Kings College,
London, served as European
Commission ambassador to
Armenia and Georgia. William
Courtney served as US ambassador to Kazakhstan and Georgia
and special assistant to the president for Russia, Ukraine and
Eurasia. Kenneth Yalowitz
served as US ambassador to
Belarus and Georgia.
(NYT/ Arab News)
Wall Street And The Average Reader
The shift of Facebook’s audience from computers to smartphones could mirror the shift from print to digital media
U
ntil May 18, the Facebook story
seemed to ride an ever-higher
wave of media attention. The
number of mentions of
Facebook in The New York
Times over the previous 12 months had
risen to heights never seen by other
technology companies (with the exception of Twitter). In the weeks leading up
to the initial public offering of Facebook
stock on May 18, The Times repeatedly
spoke of a “frenzy” around the company
and strong demand for its stock, at one
point even linking the company’s young
founder and chief executive, Mark
Zuckerberg, to “a line of revolutionaries
stretching back to Gutenberg.”
We know what happened next.
Facebook’s IPO bubble popped, and the
company settled back to earth. But looking back, was The Times – like other
news media – blinded by the mania surrounding the company before the IPO?
Or did its coverage offer the right balance of enthusiasm and scepticism?
My view is that, in the immediate runup to the IPO, the paper provided some
appropriately sceptical coverage. But it
certainly could have done more, espe-
cially for the general reader who relies
on The Times to explain the risks of the
stock market.
First, though, the positive: Several
articles did raise questions about
Facebook’s prospects. Among them:
A Page 1 article on May 15, which was
offered as a sweeping overview, pointed
to Facebook’s slowing revenue growth –
a real red flag for a company whose valuation appeared headed for a near-messianic 100 times its actual earnings. The
article also noted that Facebook’s audience was rapidly moving from computers to mobile phones and that its ability
to sell advertising on the mobile platform was unproven.
Two days later, The Times published a
piece on the front of Business Day
reporting that Madison Avenue
remained sceptical about Facebook’s
suitability as an advertising medium.
This came on the heels of an earlier article saying that General Motors had
pulled its $10 million account with
Facebook.
And, finally, on Page 6 of Business
Day on the day of the IPO, The Times
addressed the small investor in an arti-
ARTHUR S. BRISBANE | NYT NEWS SERVICE
Facebook’s disclosure
was a great opportunity to
explore the implications of
the mobile shift in depth,
but that didn’t happen.
cle headlined, “For Average Investors,
the Odds Are Long on a Big Payday
From Facebook.” The piece, accompanied by a terrific graphic, noted the
uneven record of previous tech IPOs
and ended with an expert’s quote:
“Facebook, by just about any measure,
is a great company. That doesn’t mean
that Facebook will be a great investment.”
But the paper could have done more
to hold expectations in check. For example, The Times could have delved much
more deeply into Facebook’s lastminute disclosure on May 9 about the
challenges it faced with selling advertising on mobile phones.
The shift of Facebook’s audience from
computers to smartphones could mirror
the shift of audiences from print to digital media. One of the clearest takeaways of that transition is that incumbent media struggle to retain ad dollars
when the audience moves to a new platform. Facebook’s disclosure was a great
opportunity to explore the implications
of the mobile shift in depth, but that didn’t happen.
Another thing The Times could have
done, but didn’t, was wave a red flag
prominently on the day of the IPO. As I
mentioned, small investors were
warned deep inside Business Day. But
that article was overshadowed by one on
the front of the section reporting that
tech IPOs “often achieve double-digit
gains in a one-day pop” – an article that
glowed with phrases like “feverish anticipation,” “must-own stock” and “avalanche of orders.” Ryan Chittum, who
writes for a blog, The Audit, on
Columbia Journalism Review’s website,
told me he thought the article should
have taken careful note of Facebook’s
decelerating revenue growth.
Larry Kramer, who founded the
MarketWatch business news website
and became president and publisher of
USA Today two weeks ago, offered some
praise for The Times’ coverage but
echoed the view that the paper could
have done more to help the average
investor understand the risks of the
offering.
She said the “fire hose of information”
about Facebook made it very difficult for
small investors to assess the company.
But with its specialised finance blog,
DealBook, plus its general-news mission overall, the paper is committed to
two audiences, and that is a challenge.
Larry Ingrassia, the business editor,
told me the paper writes “for a broad
and intelligent audience of generalists
but also with sophistication for a more
informed specialist audience so that
they feel that they are learning something from what we are writing.”
Doing both is clearly what is needed.
In the case of the Facebook IPO, The
Times tried to do both and delivered a
good set of offerings. But closer attention to the needs of the average reader
could have yielded more focus on the
risks, more scepticism and an even better outcome.
THE VIEWS EXPRESSED ON THE OPINION AND ANALYSIS PAGES ARE THE AUTHORS’ OWN. QATAR TRIBUNE BEARS NO RESPONSIBILITY.
Wednesday, June 6, 2012
ANALYSIS
Health is
Wealth
AMANDA GARDNER | NYT NEWS SERVICE
Avastin May Help
Fight Tough-to-Treat
Ovarian Tumors
F
RENCH researchers report that a targeted
therapy already enlisted in the fight against
colorectal cancer, lung cancer and kidney cancer may also have a role to play in recalcitrant
ovarian cancer.
According to research being presented
Saturday at the American Society of Clinical
Oncology (ASCO) annual meeting in Chicago,
Avastin (bevacizumab) doubled the time to
cancer recurrence in women who were not
responding to traditional chemotherapy.
“This is the first time that there has been a
significant advance in these difficult-to-treat
patients,” said study author Dr Eric PujadeLauraine, head of medical oncology at
Hopitaux Universitaires Paris-Centre site
Hotel-Dieu, in France. “These data open a new
era for biologics when chemotherapy is not
doing its job in recurrent ovarian cancer.”
According to Dr Elizabeth Poynor, a gynecologic oncologist and pelvic surgeon with Lenox
Hill Hospital in New York City, some physicians are already using Avastin in these settings.
This trial, she said, “provides further evidence of benefit.”
About one in five women with ovarian cancer
is resistant to platinum-based chemotherapy
or becomes resistant to it.
Avastin was the first in a class of drugs developed to inhibit angiogenesis, or the formation
of blood vessels, which helps fuel a tumor’s
growth.
This study is actually the fourth phase 3
trial finding some benefit to using Avastin for
different stages of ovarian cancer, said Dr
Jamal Rahaman, an associate clinical professor in the division of gynecologic oncology at
Mount Sinai School of Medicine, in New York
City.
The current trial involved 361 women whose
cancers had returned despite having undergone four or more cycles of platinum-based
chemotherapy.
Participants were randomly assigned to
receive one of three platinum-based
chemotherapy drugs alone or chemotherapy
plus Avastin.
Women in the combination group lived an
average of 6.7 months before their malignancy
returned, compared with 3.4 months among
women getting chemotherapy alone.
Women taking Avastin had more side effects,
including gastrointestinal perforations, hypertension and abscesses, the study authors
reported.
Because of such side effects, the US. Food
and Drug Administration recently revoked its
approval of Avastin for the treatment of
metastatic breast cancer.
The challenge now is to select those patients
for whom Avastin would be most beneficial,
said Rahaman.
A year’s worth of Avastin runs about
$100,000 a year in the United States.
Have
your say
Is there an issue you feel
strongly about, or an article
you want to comment on? QT
will carry your voice to the
public and to places where it
matters. Write to us at
ADDRESS
PO Box 23493, Doha, Qatar
TELEPHONE
+974.44422077
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EMAIL
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www.qatar-tribune.com
Maraniss’ book depicts
Obama on an intense odyssey
of self-discovery, moving
toward defining himself less
as a half-white man with white
girlfriends than as a black man
who wanted to be part of a
black community.
Gender Bender
MAUREEN DOWD | NYT NEWS SERVICE
DREAMING OF
A SUPERHERO
Obama has not sold his signature legislations-stimulus and health care bills
O
N Friday night, the
nation’s capital was under
a tornado watch. And that
was the best thing that
happened to the White
House all week.
As the president was being
slapped by Mitt Romney for being
too weak on national security, he
was being rapped by a New York
Times editorial for being too
aggressive on national security.
A Times article by Jo Becker and
Scott Shane revealed that the liberal law professor who campaigned
against torture and the Iraq war
now personally makes the final
decisions on the “kill list,” targets
for drone strikes. “A unilateral
campaign of death is untenable,”
the editorial asserted.
On Thursday, Bill Clinton once
more telegraphed that he considers President Barack Obama a
lightweight who should not have
bested his wife. Bluntly contradicting the Obama campaign theme
that Romney is a heartless corporate raider, Clinton told CNN that
the Republican’s record at Bain
was “sterling.”
Covering a humourous W at the
unveiling of his portrait, the White
House press actually seemed nostalgic for the president who bollixed up Afghanistan, Iraq, Katrina
and the economy – a sure sign that
the Obama magic is flagging.
On Friday, an ugly job market
report led to the stock market’s
worst day of the year. As the recovery flat-lined, the president conceded to a crowd at a Honeywell
factory in Golden Valley, Minn,
that “our economy is still facing
some serious headwinds” and getting sucked further into Europe’s
sinkhole.
In depressing imagery for the
start of the summer campaign,
cable channels carried the red Dow
arrow pointing down while Obama
spoke; the Dow wiped out all of its
2012 gains.
The president who started off
with such dazzle now seems inca-
pable of stimulating either the
economy or the voters. His campaign is offering Obama 2012 car
magnets for a donation of $10; cat
collars reading “I Meow for
Michelle” for $12; an Obama grill
spatula for $40, and discounted
hoodies and T-shirts. How the
mighty have fallen.
Once glowing, his press is now
burning. “To a very real degree,
2008’s candidate of hope stands
poised to become 2012’s candidate
of fear,” John Heilemann wrote in
New York magazine, noting that
because Obama feels he can’t run
on his record, his campaign will
resort to nuking Romney.
In his new book, A Nation of
Wusses, the Democrat Ed Rendell,
the
former
governor
of
Pennsylvania, wonders how “the
best communicator in campaign
history” lost his touch.
The legendary speaker who drew
campaign crowds in the tens of
thousands and inspired a dispirited nation ended up nonchalantly
delegating to a Congress, disdaining the bully pulpit, neglecting to
do any LBJ-style grunt work with
Congress and the American public,
and ceding control of his narrative.
As president, Obama has never
felt the need to explain or sell his
signature pieces of legislation – the
stimulus and health care bills – or
stanch the flow of false information from the other side.
If he wins the election, “the fever
may break,” he said. “My hope, my
expectation, is that after the election, now that it turns out that the
goal of beating Obama doesn’t
make much sense because I’m not
running again, that we can start
getting some cooperation again.”
In his new biography, Barack
Obama: The Story, David
Maraniss writes that a roommate
of the young Obama compared
him to Walker Percy’s protagonist
inThe Moviegoer: an observer of
his life, one step removed.
Obama’s boss at his community
organising job in Chicago, Jerry
Road Safety
THERE are occasions when we don’t react in time when the traffic light
turns green. When as drivers we knock down a pedestrian who crosses
or walks down the road carelessly.
Such negative driving occurs when we impose on ourselves what we
call, ‘divided attention’ in driving. Attention is a mental and physical
activity focused to ensure precision and accuracy. Attention gets divided when a person undertakes two or more activities which require the
same or similar attention, at the same time.
Driving is a sensitive and life-death situation which undoubtedly
requires maximum attention or even an extra of it.
Vigilance, focus, steadiness are some of the ingredients we need to
have to ensure safety on our roads.
The question is why drivers’ attention gets divided on roads? What
are some of the unwarranted activities which divide our attention?
Some of these activities, among others, include making and receiving
phone calls, surfing on the internet on the phone, smoking cigarettes,
over-relaxing.
Such unsafe driving behaviours create divided attention and eventually result in fatalities on our roads.
One comes across some weird activities on part of some drivers. In
some instances, one finds a driver logged on to Facebook at traffic signals oblivious of the light turning green. Drivers who are not focused
forget to correlate positively the dangerous relationship between smoke
(fire) and fuel.
Our attention on the roads should not get diverted. Let’s keep our
lives in one piece, not pieces!
FELIX OSEI OWUSU
DOHA
Kellman, observed: “He was not
unwilling to take risks, but was just
this strange combination of someone who would have to weigh
everything to death, and then take
a dramatic risk at the end. He was
reluctant to do confrontation, to
push the other side because it
might blow up – and it might.
Maraniss’ book depicts Obama
on an intense odyssey of self-discovery, moving toward defining
himself less as a half-white man
with white girlfriends than as a
black man who wanted to be part
of a black community.
His New York girlfriend,
Genevieve Cook, told Maraniss
that Obama confessed to her that
“he felt like an impostor. Because
he was so white.
There was hardly a black bone in
his body.” When she predicted that
his future might be with a black
woman.
He wanted to get out of the corporate world he found so distasteful – he described himself as “a spy
behind enemy lines” – and reimagine himself as a politician.
A president focused on historic
achievements? Imagine that. But
in his lame way, Romney got at
Obama’s problem: The Moviegoer
prefers to float above, at a reserve,
in grandiose mists.
Cook told Maraniss that she
thought Obama’s desire to “play
out a superhero life” was “a very
strong archetype in his personality.” But superheroes and mythic
figures must boldly lead.
Obama’s caution – ingrained
from a life of being deserted by his
father and sometimes his mother,
and of being, as he wrote to another girlfriend, “caught without a
class, a structure, or tradition to
support me” – has restrained him
at times.
In some ways, he’s still finding
himself, too absorbed to see what’s
not working. But the White House
is a very hard place to go on a
vision quest, especially with a
storm brewing.
“Very glad that Kenyan
expatriates in Qatar will be
able to vote for first time in
next general elections!”
M ARIE J ONES
D OHA
“The world is changed by
your example, not by your
opinion”
PAULO C OEHLO
09
Bloggers’
Borough
CAITLIN KELLY | HARVARD BUSINESS REVIEW
Artists’ Rescue
Funds Can Help
In Times Of Crisis
M
ANY Americans – the out of work, the
underwater, the plain fed up – have been
asking that question since big banks and
automakers received all those taxpayerfinanced rescues in 2008.
But it turns out that a number of small, private rescue funds have been lending a hand to
a group that is definitely not in the too-big-tofail camp: writers, artists and other creative
types. Think of these funds as sort of a TARP
for the arts crowd, only with much smaller dollar figures, and with little or no help from
Washington.
Consider the story of George Handy, a potter
in Asheville, NC He didn’t know how he would
get by financially after a Honda minivan barreled into his wood-walled studio on an
October evening in 2008, about the time of
Wall Street’s bailout. His work was destroyed,
his livelihood imperiled.
“I could have been picking glass out of my
eyes with all the windows that shattered,”
Handy said. “My file cabinet was smashed.
Pots worth $1,000 apiece were gone.”
Fortunately, Handy, 57, who has made his
living as a potter since college, had bought
home insurance for the first time a month earlier. But one claims agent dismissed his lost
work as “a handful of clay,” Handy said, though
the insurer would eventually give him just
more than $37,000.
Friends and neighbours lent a hand, but
then more financial aid came from
CERF(PLUS), the Craft Emergency Relief
Fund, which helps artists in need with grants
and
long-term
interest-free
loans.
CERF(PLUS) gave him $4,500 in all: a $3,150
loan and a $1,350 grant. That, in addition to
what he received from the insurance claim,
was enough to see him through.
A run of bad luck – a car accident, an illness,
the loss of a job by a spouse or partner – can
mean financial disaster for many artists, who
are often self-employed. And their numbers
are huge: almost 2 million artists of various
types are in the labour force, according to the
National Endowment for the Arts.
Unlike financial companies and automakers,
which received a combined $700 billion from
Washington in the Troubled Asset Relief
Program, most artists don’t qualify for any
bailouts. Personal savings, insurance, a generous relative or an emergency grant is often all
that stands between them and financial ruin.
“A lot of artists fall between the cracks,
between FEMA and the Small Business
Administration,” said Cornelia Carey, executive director of CERF(PLUS). The group has
been working since 2006 with state, regional
and federal agencies and foundations to help
creative workers survive personal financial
crises and to plan for possible disasters like
hurricanes, tornadoes, floods or medical emergencies.
Many can’t afford such preparations themselves.
“They’re both high-need and very vulnerable,” Carey said. “They often have a low and
erratic income, sporadic employment and
most are not big enough to access a loan from
the
Small
Business
Administration.
Preparedness is kind of the last thing that gets
done.”
Andy Nulman, president of Just for Laughs,
the annual comedy festival based in Montreal,
expressed similar sentiments.
“An artist’s brain is just a different head
space,” Nulman said. “They don’t necessarily
plan for tomorrow. An artist is a dreamer. The
next hit might be right around the corner.”
Nulman has worked with comedians from
around the world, including Mike MacDonald,
a Canadian who is now living with his mother
in Ottawa, while awaiting a liver transplant.
MacDonald, 57, recently toured in British
Columbia, netting $5,000, a small fraction of
the income of his best years, which was as
much as $22,000 a month.
“I did 28 shows in 31 days playing really
small venues,” MacDonald said of his recent
tour. “Talk about the economic crunch.”
Weakened by his illness, he spent four days in
the hospital during the tour.
Now too sick to work, his retirement savings
gone and hoping to net $50,000 from the sale
of his suburban Los Angeles home, he recently
pleaded his case on the Internet – on
GoFundMe.com, a donations site. Within three
days, he had raised more than $26,000.
“It’s amazing. I’ve never seen this,” said
Howard Lapides, his manager of 30 years.
MacDonald, at least, can live with his mother and, because of Canada’s government-run
health care system, faces no continuing medial
bills. Chrystle Fiedler, 54, a freelance writer in
Greenport, NY, is not so fortunate.
To Be Continued
10
Wednesday, June 6, 2012
PAKISTAN
www.qatar-tribune.com
Qaeda’s second-in-command was Monday’s drone attack target: US
AFP
WASHINGTON
AL QAEDA’S second-incommand Abu Yahya al Libi
was the target of a US drone
strike that killed 15 people in
Pakistan’s lawless tribal belt
on Monday, US media
reported.
US officials confirmed to
The New York Times that
Libi had been the target of
the missile attack in North
Waziristan, a Taliban and Al
Qaeda stronghold along the
Afghan border, but could not
say whether he had survived.
“People are looking very
closely to see whether he’s
still alive,” a US official told
Top rights
activist
fears threat to
life from ISI
the Times.
“It’ll take some time for
people to gain a high level of
confidence that he’s dead.
But he’s number two in Al
Qaeda, and this would be a
major blow.”
A senior US official also
told ABC News that Libi had
been the target of the attack,
the third drone strike in as
many days and the deadliest
this year.
A senior Pakistani security
source in Peshawar, meanwhile, told the Times that it
“looks like he has been
killed.”
“This would be a major
blow to core Al Qaeda —
removing the number two
Qaeda No 2 Abu Yahya al Libi
leader twice in less than a
year,” a senior US official
told AFP, declining to con-
firm whether Libi was dead
or alive. “The degradation to
core Al Qaeda during the
past several years has depleted the ranks to such an
extent that there is now no
clear successor to take on the
breadth of his responsibilities, putting additional pressure on (Ayman al ) Zawahiri
to try to manage the group in
an effective way.”
The official, who spoke on
condition of anonymity,
noted that Libi had served as
“general manager” for Al
Qaeda’s main branch, overseeing its daily operations in
Pakistani’s lawless tribal
regions and managing links
to affiliates around the
world.
Libi, a Libyan citizen
believed to be in his late 40s,
has been an influential Al
Qaeda commander. He
became the international terror network’s deputy leader
after the August death of
Atiyah abd al Rahman,
another Libyan national who
was killed in a US missile
strike in North Waziristan.
The militant leader, who
has a $1 million US bounty
on his head, was falsely
reported dead previously,
after a December 2009
drone strike in South
Waziristan.
Pakistani officials said two
missiles slammed into a
compound in the village of
Hesokhel, east of Miranshah,
the capital of North
COLLECTING GARBAGE
Scavengers search for recyclable items from a garbage dump on the occasion of World Environment Day, in Lahore, on Tuesday. The day is celebrated every year on
June 5 with the objective to raise global awareness for world environmental concerns. (AFP)
Waziristan, before dawn.
A security official in
Miranshah told AFP that the
bodies of those killed could
not be identified and that
there were unconfirmed
reports that foreigners were
among the dead, a possible
reference to Al Qaeda fighters. Should his death be confirmed, Libi would be among
the highest profile Al Qaeda
militants killed by US forces
since a Navy SEAL raid killed
former leader Osama bin
Laden in May 2011.
Libi was captured in 2002
and was held at the US highsecurity prison at Bagram
Air Base. But he escaped
three years later.
US stops
funding for
Sesame Street
AP
PTI
KABUL
LAHORE
LEADING rights activist
Asma Jahangir has said
she has received information that Pakistan’s
powerful security establishment is planning to
carry out a “murderous
attack” on her, prompting civil society groups
to condemn the threat to
her life.
Jahangir, who is also a
leading lawyer and campaigner for democracy,
told TV news channels
about the threats to her
life late on Monday
night.
She said a credible
source had informed her
about a “murderous
attack” planned on her
by state agencies, following which she had
restricted her movements and decided to
remain at home.
She contended that
the plan to kill her had
been hatched at the
“highest level” of state
agencies, which were
apparently angered by
her efforts to highlight
human rights violation
by security forces in the
restive province of
Balochistan.
Jahangir also provided details of what she
said were steps taken
against her by Pakistan’s
intelligence agencies.
She alleged when a
group of lawyers recently tried to book a venue
for a meeting in which
she was to participate,
they were barred from
doing so by the InterServices
Intelligence
agency.
On another occasion,
some lawyers detained
two persons who were
part of a group that tried
to attack her at a court
complex, Jahangir said.
“One of these persons
had an Intelligence
Bureau identity card and
the other had an ISI
card,” she told a TV channel. The Human Rights
Commission of Pakistan
said a “highly credible
source” had provided
information about a serious threat to Jahangir.
THE US has terminated funding for a $20 million project
to develop a Pakistani version
of Sesame Street, the US
embassy said on Tuesday.
The decision came as a
Pakistani newspaper reported
allegations of corruption by
the local puppet theatre
working on the initiative.
The organisation in question is the Rafi Peer theatre
Workshop, a group in the city
of Lahore that jointly developed the show with Sesame
Workshop, the creator of the
American series.
Officials at Rafi
Peer allegedly
used the US
money to pay off
old debts.
US apology needed to open
NATO supply routes: Khar
AFP
WASHINGTON
THE United States should
apologise for an air raid that
killed 24 Pakistani soldiers if
it wants Pakistan to reopen
key supply routes into
Afghanistan,
Foreign
Minister Hina Rabbani Khar
said in an interview published on Monday.
Angered over the lethal
November attack, Islamabad
shut the supply routes vital
for US and allied troops, forcing the alliance to rely on
longer, more expensive
northern routes through
Russia and Central Asia.
“A representative parliament of 180 million people
has spoken on one subject,”
Khar told Foreign Policy,
referring to new guidelines
for
US-Pakistan
ties
approved by Pakistani law-
makers which call for an
apology.
A US apology is “something which should have
been forthcoming the day
this incident happened,
and what a partnership not
only
demands,
but
requires,” she said.
The on-again, off-again
relationship
between
Islamabad and Washington
is at a new low, and with US
elections
looming
in
November, President Barack
Obama is unlikely to say
sorry to Pakistan and make
himself vulnerable to attacks
from his Republican challenger, Mitt Romney.
A NATO summit in
Chicago ended two weeks
ago without a deal on the
NATO supply lines.
Khar, however, said that
despite the political challenges, the United States
should live up to its principles of doing “what we consider to be right rather than
what is more popular.”
She noted that Pakistan
also has political obstacles of
its own.
“For us in Pakistan... the
most popular thing to do right
now is to not move on NATO
supply routes at all. It is to
close them forever,” she said.
“If I were a political advisor to
the prime minister, this is
what I would advise him to
do. But I’m not advising him
to do that... because what is at
stake is much more important for Pakistan than just
winning an election.”
The
roads
through
Pakistan, now shuttered for
over six months, are a crucial
logistical link for NATO as it
plans a large-scale withdrawal of combat troops and hardware by the end of 2014.
Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar, in Islamabad, on Tuesday. (AFP)
The show, which includes
Elmo and a host of new
Pakistani characters, first
aired in December and was
supposed to run for at least
three seasons.
The US hoped it would
improve education in a country where one-third of primary school-age children are
not in class. It was also meant
to increase tolerance at a time
when the influence of radical
views is growing.
US Embassy spokesman
Robert Raines said the US
Agency for International
Development
terminated
funding for the programme,
but declined to provide further details.
The Pakistan Today newspaper reported on Tuesday
that the cause was “severe”
financial irregularities at Rafi
Peer, citing unnamed sources
close to the project. Officials
at Rafi Peer allegedly used the
US money to pay off old debts
and awarded lucrative contracts to relatives, the sources
claimed.
Faizaan Peerzada, the chief
operating officer of Rafi Peer
and one of several family
members who run the organisation, denied the corruption
allegations. He said the US
ended its participation after
providing
$10
million
because of the lack of additional available funds.
If the corruption allegations
prove true, it would be an
embarrassment for the multibillion-dollar programme.
Nuclear-capable Hatf-VII cruise missile test-fired
AGENCIES
ISLAMABAD
PAKISTAN on Tuesday tested a fifth nuclear-capable
cruise missile since India
launched last month a new
long-range ballistic missile,
Agni V, capable of delivering
a one-ton nuclear warhead
anywhere in China.
The statement issued by
the military said that indige-
nously developed Cruise
Missile Hatf-VII (Babur)
having a range of 700 kilometers, is a low flying, terrain hugging missile with
high maneuverability, pin
point accuracy and radar
avoidance features.
It can carry both nuclear
and conventional warheads
and has stealth capabilities.
“It also incorporates the
most modern cruise missile
technology
of
Terrain
Contour Matching (TERCOM) and Digital Scene
Matching and Area Co-relation
(DSMAC),
which
enhances its precision and
effectiveness manifolds,” the
statement said.
The missile was launched
from a state-of-the-art multi
tube Missile Launch Vehicle
(MLV) which significantly
enhances the targeting and
The statement
issued by the
military said that
indigenously developed Cruise
Missile Hatf-VII
(Babur) having a
range of 700 kilometers, is a low
flying, terrain
hugging missile.
employment options of
Babur Weapon System in
both the conventional and
nuclear modes.
“The test will consolidate
Pakistan’s strategic deterrence capability, and further
strengthen national security,” the statement said. The
president and prime minister of Pakistan congratulated the scientists and engineers on the successful test
of the latest cruise missile.
The Hatf-VII (Babur) was
the fifth missile tested by
Pakistan since last month.
On May 31, Pakistan test
fired nuclear- capable HatfVIII cruise missile with a
range of more than 350 km.
On May 29, Islamabad tested its quick reaction tactical
nuclear-capable
Hatf-IX
missile with a range of 60
km on May 29.
Pakistan conducted a test
of the nuclear- capable HatfIII ballistic missile with a
range of 290 km on May 10.
On April 25, six days after
India tested the Agni-V missile with a range of 5,000
km, Pakistan tested an
improved version of the
nuclear-capable
Hatf-IV
intermediate range ballistic
missile with the range of
1,000 km.
Wednesday, June 6, 2012
INDIA
www.qatar-tribune.com
11
UP, Kerala oppose
common entrance
test for engineering
institutions
PTI
NEW DELHI
US Secretary of Defence Leon Panetta (left) with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, in New Delhi, on Tuesday. (AFP)
US wants India to play more
active role in Afghanistan
REUTERS
NEW DELHI
US DEFENCE Secretary Leon
Panetta will encourage India
to take a more active role in
Afghanistan as international
forces draw down after a
decade of war, US officials
said on Tuesday as the
Pentagon chief arrived in New
Delhi for two days of talks.
The officials, speaking on
condition of anonymity,
acknowledged the longstanding rivalry between India and
Pakistan for influence in
Afghanistan but insisted that
both countries had an interest
in working with the international community to ensure
stability in their northern
neighbour. “There is a risk
that the tensions and histori-
D K Joshi
to be new
Navy chief
cal mistrust between India
and Pakistan could lead them
to view their respective roles
in Afghanistan as being in
conflict,” one official said.
“This is not predestined. This
does not have to be the case.”
Pakistan wields considerable influence over neighbouring Afghanistan, while
India is already one of its
biggest bilateral donors, having pledged about $2 billion
since the 2001 US led-invasion for projects from the construction of highways to the
building of the Afghan parliament.
In October, India and
Afghanistan signed a wideranging agreement to deepen
ties, including to help train
Afghan security forces, a deal
that angered Pakistan.
Their remarks came as
Panetta flew to India as part of
his week-long Asia tour to
explain a new US military
strategy to allies and partners
in the region.
The strategy calls for a
shift in US focus to the Asia-
PTI
NEW DELHI
NEW DELHI
NEW DELHI
THE government on Tuesday
cleared the appointment of
Vice-Admiral D K Joshi, the
present Western Naval
Command chief, as the new
Navy chief after Admiral
Nirmal Verma retires on
August 31.
Vice-Admiral Joshi, a specialist in anti-submarine warfare, had assumed command
of the Western Naval
Command in May last year.
Vice-Admiral Joshi, who
has also commanded the triService
Andaman
and
Nicobar Island command in
the past, has commanded the
guided-missile corvette INS
Kuthar,
guided-missile
destroyer Ranvir and the
country’s solitary aircraft carrier INS Viraat during his
long career.
A graduate of the Naval
War College, USA, he is also
an alumnus of the College of
Naval Warfare, Mumbai and
National Defence College,
New Delhi.
He takes over at a time
when the Navy’s ongoing
warship, submarine and maritime aircraft acquisition programmes as well as proposed
projects in the pipeline are
estimated to together cost
well over Rs 3,00,000 crore
over the next 15 years.
Contracts for another 45
warships, including six new
submarines and seven stealth
frigates, are in the pipeline.
United States
views India as a
logical partner to
work with on security and stability
issues.
Pacific region.
Panetta announced on
Saturday during a speech at
the Shangri-La Dialogue, a
security
conference
in
Singapore, that the US military would rebalance its military assets so that by the year
2020 60 percent of US warships would be in the region,
versus 50 percent now.
The officials said the
United States views India as a
logical partner to work with
on security and stability
issues in the Indian Ocean
region and that India was
singled out for its importance
in the new strategy.
Panetta is expected to elaborate on that theme during
his meetings with senior
defence and political leaders,
as well as in a speech at a
think tank on Wednesday.
India has a long history of
involvement in the country
and its activities have often
been viewed suspiciously by
Pakistan, which is concerned
about being diplomatically
encircled by its longtime
enemy.
India has trained Afghan
army and police over the past
decade, but on a relatively
small scale, the US officials
said. It has also increasingly
helped Afghanistan with its
economic reconstruction, the
officials said. “As we look to the
future development of peace
and stability in Afghanistan ...
we know that the regional
actors, Afghanistan’s neighbours and extended neighbours like India will play a
greater role,” one official said.
Almost all states
also opposed the
centre’s proposal to allow flexibility to prestigious IITs.
It was explained that
States would have the freedom to join in the common
examination system and
have the autonomy to
determine their own relative weightages to normalised Class XII Board
marks, performance in
JEE-MAIN and JEEADVANCED.
Almost all states also
opposed the centre’s proposal to allow flexibility to
prestigious IITs according
to which they can adopt a
methodology for selection
and admission of students
which is different from the
same in NITs and IIITs.
Led by Bihar, Education
Ministers almost unanimously said they cannot
agree with a provision in
the centre’s proposal that
the selection criteria for
candidates for the IITs
would be different even as
all the aspirants or IITS,
IIITs and NIT will have to
appear in a common test
under a new format.
Modi blamed for New guidelines for SEZ in pipeline
Joshi’s exit
IANS
PTI
“India and Pakistan share
an interest, the same interest
that we have, of peace and stability in Afghanistan,” the official said. “That makes
Pakistan more peaceful and
stable and it makes India a lot
more stable.”
THE Centre’s proposal for
a common entrance test
for all engineering institutions, along with the tests
for IITs and other central
institutes like NITs and
IIITs, met with stiff resistance from some Indian
states at a meeting of education
ministers
on
Tuesday.
In the light of their
opposition, states have
been given the flexibility to
opt out of the proposed
common entrance test by
conducting examinations
for engineering institutions coming under their
authority.
Another proposal to
allow flexibility to IITs to
adopt a methodology of
admission of students different from NITs and
IIITs also met with opposition from almost all the
states.
While Congress-ruled
Kerala and Samajwadi
Party-ruled Uttar Pradesh
on Tuesday opposed the
government’s move on the
common entrance test,
some states including BJPruled Madhya Pradesh and
Gujarat said that they
would implement the centre’s proposal.
Gujarat has also written
to the Centre supporting
the
common
test.
Congress-ruled states of
Haryana, Assam and
Maharashtra also supported the Centre, sources said.
However, HRD Minister
Kapil Sibal claimed that
“the overwhelming opinion” was in support of the
common test.
Kerala
Education
Minister P K Abdu Rabb
said his state was agree for
a common test for central
government institutions
like IIT, NIT and IIIT. “But
a common test for engineering institutions under
the jurisdiction of the state
government is not acceptable,” he said. “That question does not arise,” he told
reporters.
Considering the strong
opposition from Kerala
and Uttar Pradesh, Sibal
said flexibility is given to
the states which are under
no compulsion to join the
common entrance test for
institutes under their jurisdiction.
NEARLY 10 days after Sanjay
Joshi had to resign from the
BJP’s national executive,
posters appeared on Tuesday
attacking Gujarat Chief
Minister Narendra Modi.
Although the posters did
not refer to Modi by name,
they blamed his exit on the
stubborness of “one leader” —
a clear reference to the
Gujarat chief minister.
Modi agreed to attend last
month’s national executive of
the Bharatiya Janata Party in
Mumbai only after BJP presi-
dent Nitin Gadkari asked
Joshi, Modi’s known foe, to
leave the leadership panel.
One of the posters
appeared mysteriously outside the gates of the BJP
national headquarters here and was quickly taken off.
Another came up at the gate
of BJP leader Murli Manohar
Joshi’s residence.
The multi-colour posters
had a large image of Joshi. It
described his forced exit from
the national executive as “bullying”. Modi and Joshi have
been at loggerheads for years.
Modi stayed away from campaigning in UP..
THE Indian government will
come out with new guidelines to revive export hubs,
special
economic
zones(SEZs), which have lost
sheen after imposition of
certain levies and proposal to
take away tax incentives.
The government had
imposed
Minimum
Alternative Tax (MAT) and
Dividend Distribution Tax
(DDT) on SEZs in 2010-11,
which were earlier exempted
from almost all levies.
Admitting that due to
imposition of MAT and DDT,
there has been a “visible
slowdown” in growth of
export
from
SEZs,
Commerce and Industry
Minister of India Anand
Sharma on Tuesday said a
new set of guidelines would
be announced to make the
SEZ policy more buoyant.
“We have undertaken a
comprehensive assessment
of the SEZ Scheme to re-visit
certain aspects of the policy
and operational framework
and after concluding the
inter- ministerial consultations, we will be able to come
out with new guidelines to
make the operation of the
SEZ policy more buoyant,”
he said, while announcing
the supplementary Foreign
Trade Policy.
The Direct Tax Codes
(DTC) being considered by
Parliament proposes to do
away with the income tax
exemption given to them and
instead link tax sops to
investments made in them.
Over 100 developers are seeking
more time from
the government to
execute their projects and over 50
developers have
surrendered the
projects.
Profit-linked benefits were
the main attraction of the
SEZ scheme.
The initial phase of SEZ
scheme, launched in 2006,
saw developers lining up in
big numbers for projects. It
was also seen as a real estate
opportunity.
At present, over 100 developers are seeking more time
from the government to execute their projects and over
50 developers have surrendered the projects.
Exports from SEZs stood
at Rs 3.65 lakh crore in 201112.
With investment of Rs
2.02 crore, these zones provide employment to over
8.45 lakh.
Overseas
shipments
from the 153 operational
tax free havens have come
down to 12 per cent in the
country’s total exports
from about 30 per cent in
the previous years.
No cause for alarm on economic front: Chidambaram
PTI
BHOPAL
Home Minister P Chidambaram, in New Delhi, recently. (PTI)
STEPPING out of the capital, the Group of Ministers
(GoM) on Media on
Tuesday held an interaction
with journalists here to
assuage concerns over the
current economic situation,
saying there is no cause for
alarm or panic.
“Just as we recovered
after 2008-09, we are confident we can recover in
2012-13 and 2013-14.
Kindly remember that we
are subject to what is happening in the international
arena,” Home Minister P
Chidambaram said.
Chidambaram said in the
first of the media interaction
programmes of the GoM in
We are confident
we can recover in
2012-13 and 201314. Kindly remember that we are
subject to what is
happening in the
international arena
P CHIDAMBARAM
state capitals that he was in
Bhopal to mark the completion of three years of UPA-II
as “there is much to be satisfied about but there are also
challenges.” Along with two
other member of the group—
Law
Minister
Salman
Khurshid and Minister of
State in the PMO V
Narayanasamy, he said,
“2011-12 has been a year of
declining growth because of
the eurozone crisis. While we
recognise the challenges the
economy faces, I want to say
on behalf of the government
that there is no cause for
alarm or panic.”
The ministers were in
Bhopal to meet Bhopal gas
victims and activists in the
wake of the Supreme Court
asking the government last
month to take a decision on
the disposal of toxic waste
left in the aftermath of the
disaster in 1984 which had
claimed thousands of lives.
“The centre had spoken to
the governments of Madhya
Pradesh,
Gujarat
and
Maharashtra but all of them
refused to allow disposal of
the toxic waste,” the home
minister, who visited the
Bhopal Memorial Hospital,
set up for gas tragedy victims, said.
“Before saying anything
about the manner in which
the present situation was
being handled, one must
remember that there were
different contexts in which
the UPA-I and UPA-II were
functioning,” the former
finance minister said .
12
Wednesday, June 6, 2012
SOUTH INDIA
www.qatar-tribune.com
CBI grills Jagan,
two others in
illegal assets case
IANS
HYDERABAD
People living close to the Arabian Sea coast try to put sand bags to protect their house from big waves, in Kochi, on Tuesday. (AP)
Monsoon hits Kerala coast
IANS
THIRUVANANTHAPURAM
THE southwest monsoon,
crucial for agriculture, hit
Kerala on Tuesday, with a
senior official saying that the
four-day delay was not a
cause for worry.
Although moderate to
heavy rains have been lashing most parts of Kerala for
some days, the India
Meteorological Department
(IMD) made the monsoon
announcement only on
Tuesday.
Kottayam,
Alappuzha,
Ernakulam and Kasargode
have been lashed by rains.
The sea turned rough in
Alappuzha, with sea waters
Karunanidhi
backs BJP view
on ECs, CAG
PTI
CHENNAI
BACKING L K Advani’s suggestion for a collegium to
appoint
Election
Commissioners and CAG, M
Karunanidhi, chief of southern Indian party DMK, on
Tuesday said the BJP leader’s
views could not be ignored
and expressed confidence
that the Centre would accord
due importance to it.
“I am also in agreement
with the contents in the letter
(of Advani). It cannot be
ignored just because it is the
opposition view,” the DMK
patriarch said writing in the
party mouthpiece Murasoli.
Advani had voiced concern
over the present system of
appointment.
encroaching into land at a
few places.
But the dry weather continued in the southern districts
of Kollam and Thiruvananthapuram.
The monsoon accounts for
80 percent of the rainfall in
India. Even a minor delay
can adversely affect the economy as about half of India’s
farm output comes from
crops sown in the JuneSeptember rainy season.
IMD director general L S
Rathore told IANS in New
Delhi that the monsoon was
expected to advance rapidly
into other parts of the country. Karnataka would be
lashed by heavy rains within
days. Kerala gets the annual
monsoon rains June 1, marking the start of weeks of
showers in the Indian mainland. Last year, however, the
monsoon arrived in the state
May 29.
The monsoon
accounts for 80
percent of the rainfall in India. Even a
minor delay can
adversely affect
the economy.
Rathore said there was
nothing to panic as the fourday monsoon delay was well
within the forecast limits.
From 2005, the IMD has
been issuing operational
forecasts for the onset of the
monsoon over Kerala using
an indigenously developed
statistical model with a
model error of (+/-) four.
The IMD has said that the
2012 southwest monsoon
season (June-September) for
the country as a whole was
most likely to be normal.
“The deviation in arrival of
monsoon rains would have
no adverse impact on sowing
of kharif (summer) crops like
paddy and pulses,” he said.
The monsoon normally
reaches Delhi by June-end.
but according to IMD it is too
early to say when the capital
will get rains.
“We can only make date
specific forecast towards the
end of this month by seeing
the spread of monsoon in the
rest of the country,” IMD
director B P Yadav said.
Agriculture expert Devinder
Sharma was, however, cautious. “The delay in monsoon
by a day or two is fine. But the
most important thing is the
spread of monsoon.”
He said that in last few
years, there have been cases
when monsoon arrived
before time but states like
Rajasthan, Gujarat and Bihar
did not receive sufficient
rains, leading to crop failure.
IMD official K Santhosh in
Thiruvananthapuram said he
was getting telephone calls
demanding to know why the
announcement of monsoon
arrival was made when the
city was yet to get rains.
Special fertility treatment grant
for tribal couples in Goa
PTI
PANAJI
THE government in the
Indian state of Goa has
introduced a fertility treatment plan for economically
weaker tribals of the state to
take care of their medical
expenses.
Under the plan, Rs 1 lakh
would be provided to couples for their medical
expenses, state tribal welfare
minister Ramesh Tawadkar
said.
“Government-run hospitals in the state do not offer
fertility treatment. Many
couples are childless as they
do not have enough money
to get treated in a private
clinic,” he said.
Government has
also drafted a
scheme for providing Rs 25 lakh
each for tribal
villages to have a
community hall
and moneitory
help for the final
rites.
With the scheme, the couples could now seek treatment at private hospitals, he
said. The new initiative also
aims at providing tribals the
financial help to tackle
issues regarding problems of
shelter.
“Many tribal children cannot complete their education
because dwellings in which
they living are crumbling.
They have no facilities to sit
and study,” Tawadkar, a
tribal rights campaigner
himself, said.
The state government is
working on a scheme to give
one time grant of Rs two
lakh for the tribals, who
have an annual income of
less than three lakh, to
repair their houses, he said,
adding that a monitoring
committee would be consti-
tuted to oversee the repair
works.
The state government
would constitute a special
team to visit all the tribal villages and submit a roadmap
giving detailed requirements, he said.
“For the first year, target is
to provide these schemes to
5,000 households, which are
in dire need,” the minister
added.
Government has also
drafted a scheme for providing Rs 25 lakh each for tribal
villages to have a community hall and Rs 20,000 per
poor tribals as a moneitory
help for the final rites,
he added.
THE Central Bureau of
Investigation (CBI) grilled
jailed MP Y S Jaganmohan
Reddy for over six hours for
the third day on Tuesday
while his two aides were also
questioned in an illegal
assets case.
The CBI took custody of
Jagan, as the young leader is
popularly known, from the
Chanchalguda Central Jail
in Hyderabad in the morning and after questioning
him at the agency’s office at
Koti shifted him back to the
jail in the evening.
Congress legislator D
Chandrasekhar Reddy and
Sakshi TV director S
Ramakrishna Reddy also
reached the CBI office in
response to the notices
served by the CBI.
Chandrasekhar Reddy had
reportedly worked as a nominee director in Janani
Infrastructure owned by
Jagan. He had recently
called on Jagan’s mother Y S
Vijayamma to express his
solidarity.
The CBI officials are
believed to have questioned
him and Ramakrishna
Reddy in the presence of
Jagan about the investments
received
by
Janani
Infrastructure and Jagati
Publications.
The CBI has so far questioned the Kadapa MP about
the investments received
from industrialist Nimmagadda Prasad in return for
the land and other concessions given for his port project Vanpic.
He is believed to have
been grilled about the
investments that flowed
from some companies based
abroad into his Sandur
Power and other firms.
Jagan, who was arrested
by the CBI on May 27,
allegedly conspired with his
father and then chief minister Y S Rajasekhara Reddy to
dole out favours to compa-
nies which made investments into his businesses on
quid pro quo basis.
The CBI on Monday
issued
a
notice
to
Information
Technology
Minister
Ponnala
Lakshmaiah, directing him
to appear for questioning on
June 7.
Lakshmaiah, as the minister for major industries in
Rajasekhara Reddy’s cabinet, had issued an order
allocating water from the
Krishna river for a cement
company.
Congress legislator D Chandrasekhar Reddy
and Sakshi TV
director S Ramakrishna Reddy also
reached the CBI
office in response
to the notices
served by the CBI.
Chandrasekhar
Reddy had reportedly worked as a
nominee director
in Janani Infrastructure owned by
Jagan.
The central agency on May
24 arrested Excise Minister
Mopidevi Venkataramna,
who as the then minister for
infrastructure and investments, had issued orders
allotting huge land and
granting other concessions
to Vanpic.
Venkataramna along with
Jagan, Nimmagadda Prasad
and bureaucrat K V
Brahmananda Reddy are
currently
lodged
in
Chanchalguda jail.
Meanwhile, the CBI court
posted to Thursday orders
on the bail petition of
Venkataramna. The CBI
opposed his bail petition on
the ground that he may
tamper with the evidence.
The agency also accused him
of misleading the cabinet
while allotting 24,000 acres
of land to Vanpic.
YSR Congress party Chief Y S Jaganmohan Reddy.
Mani appeals Kerala HC to quash FIR against him
PTI
KOCHI
Senior CPI-M functionary M M Mani.
IN the eye of a storm over his
controversial speech, senior
CPI-M functionary M M
Mani on Tuesday filed a petition in the Kerala High Court,
seeking to quash the FIR registered against him by police
in three cases on the basis of
his recent disclosures in
Idukki.
Mani, CPI-M’s Idukki district secretary had stated at a
public meeting at Thodupuzha that the party had
eliminated at least three of its
political foes in the 1980s,
causing a huge embarrassment to the party.
Police had registered cases
against him on the basis of
the disclosures. On Monday,
a case pertaining to murder
of a Congress worker Ancheri
Baby, who was shot dead on
November 13, 1982 was registered by police against
Mani and five others under
Section 120(b) (punishment
of criminal conspiracy) and
Sect 118 (concealing the
design to commit the crime).
Mani contended that the
order of the Judicial First
Mani alleged that
registration of the
crime was part of
a state-level conspiracy hatched
by Congress and
that the Special
Investigation
Team controlled
by the Home
Minister.
Class magistrate, Nedumkandam was without jurisdiction and sanction of law.
Hence he was not justified
in entertaining the petition
by police, permitting the
Investigating Officer to conduct further investigation in
the case, he said.
He alleged the First
Information Report was ‘prepared’
in
Thiruvananthapuram at the instance
of the Chief Minster and
Home Minister and handed
over
to
the
Idukki
Superintendent of Police
with a direction to register a
crime. There is no material
available warranting registration of three new crimes,
he claimed.
Due to “continuous intervention” of the Chief Minister
and the Home Minister,
police was registering new
crimes in a “clandestine manner”, fabricating evidence
and procuring witnesses who
are inimical to him, he
alleged.
Mani alleged that registration of the crime was part of a
state-level
conspiracy
hatched by Congress and that
the Special Investigation
Team, controlled by the
Home Minister, was out to
“destroy” CPI-M and the
petitioner.
Wednesday, June 6, 2012
WORLD
Japan PM
urged to be
cautious on
N-restarts
REUTERS
TOKYO
NEARLY a third of Japan’s
ruling party lawmakers are
petitioning Prime Minister
Yoshihiko Noda to be cautious about restarting nuclear
reactors given safety concerns
after last year’s earthquake
and tsunami, an organiser
said on Tuesday.
Noda, keen to restart two
reactors in western Japan
before electricity demand
peaks this summer, could
decide as early as this week to
reconnect them to the grid despite the risk of a backlash
that would weaken his
already sagging voter ratings.
“It is clear from surveys
that the majority of the people think that we can survive
this summer by conserving
energy and transferring
electricity among regions,”
said the petition, to be presented to Noda’s government later in the day.
Noda, keen to
restart two reactors in western
Japan before electricity demand
peaks this summer, could decide
as early as this
week to reconnect
them to the grid despite the risk of
a backlash that
would weaken his
already sagging
voter ratings.
“We urge you to consider
the fact that there is insufficient agreement within the
party and among the people
and the feelings of the
160,000 victims of the disaster, and be all the more cautious about a decision to
restart the reactors.”
Nuclear power supplied
nearly 30 percent of Japan’s
electricity needs before last
year’s earthquake and tsunami crippled the Fukushima
plant in northeast Japan. But
all of the country’s 50 reactors
have since been taken offline
for checks.
Noda on Monday stressed
that restarting the idled reactors was vital not just to survive summer power shortages
but also to avoid hurting the
economy with higher electricity rates, a view commonly
voiced by Japan’s struggling
manufacturers.
But Satoshi Arai, an exnational strategy minister
sponsoring the petition, said
Noda had failed to meet conditions for resuming operations at the two Kansai
Electric Power Co reactors at
its Ohi plant in Fukui, western Japan.
www.qatar-tribune.com
13
China, Russia to boost UN ties
AFP
BEIJING
RUSSIAN and China pledged
on Tuesday to increase their
cooperation in the United
Nations, as the giant neighbours try to resist mounting
pressure for international
action to stop the bloodshed
in Syria.
China’s President Hu
Jintao said closer cooperation
would allow the two countries, whose stance has
angered Western powers, to
“set the global political and
economic order in a more fair
and rational direction”.
He made the comments
after talks with Vladimir
Putin, who is in Beijing for a
regional summit on his first
visit to Asia since winning a
historic third term as Russia’s
president.
“We plan to increase cooperation in the framework of
leading international organisations — the United Nations,
G20, BRICS and Shanghai
Cooperation Organisation,”
Putin told reporters after the
talks, echoing similar comments by Hu.
China and Russia — permanent members of the UN
Security Council — have
walked in lockstep on Syria to
the anger of Arab and
Western nations, and they
both used their veto power
earlier this year to block
action against Damascus.
EU president Herman Van
Rompuy on Monday told Putin
in Russia that world powers
needed to “find common mes-
sages on which we agree”.
Known for confronting the
West repeatedly during his
2000-2008 presidency, Putin
pointedly skirted the issue of
Syria during the briefing with
EU leaders, noting only that
“our positions do not coincide
on every issue”.
Putin has been keen to play
up the importance of Russia’s
at-times uneasy ties with
China, which have grown
stronger in the past year amid
growing international pressure for action on Syria — an
ally of both countries.
China’s foreign ministry
spokesman Liu Weimin told
reporters earlier Tuesday that
both Beijing and Moscow
were united on Syria, opposing foreign intervention and
forced regime change in the
conflict-ridden country.
“The position of both sides
is clear to all — there should
be an immediate end to violence and the political dialogue process should be
launched as soon as possible,”
he said.
“China and Russia share
the same position on these
points and both sides oppose
external intervention into the
Syrian situation and oppose
regime change by force.”
Putin told Hu that China
and Russia’s interests “align
perfectly in a great many
areas, including in cooperating on the world stage, in economic and financial cooperation, high-tech, people and
culture and other areas.”
“Through the sustained
efforts of both sides, the Russia-
Russian President Vladimir Putin (seated, left) and his Chinese counterpart Hu Jintao (seated, right) sign documents during a ceremony
at the Great Hall of the People, in Beijing, on Tuesday. (AP)
China overall strategic cooperative partnership relationship
has attained new heights,” he
said during his meeting with
the Chinese leader.
Putin, who will attend a
regional security summit
starting Wednesday in
Beijing, is also due to meet
with Hu’s likely successor
Vice President Xi Jinping, as
well as the presidents of Iran
and Afghanistan.
The two countries also
signed 12 diplomatic and business agreements on Tuesday
to support booming trade —
which reached $80 billion last
year — and finalised a deal to
establish a joint $4 billion
investment fund.
The Russian fund and the
Chinese sovereign wealth
fund will each contribute $1
billion to the joint venture,
while the rest will come from
Chinese investors.
Seventy percent of the
fund’s investments will be in
Russian projects, and the rest
in China in the fields of auto
manufacturing, timber processing, agriculture, transport
and logistics.
The Russian delegation
includes six cabinet members,
the heads of Russia’s energy
giants Gazprom, Rosneft and
Transneft, and other major
Russian business people.
While energy is high on the
agenda, a long-awaited gas
deal that could see Russia
supply 70 billion cubic metres
of gas a year directly to China
was not signed on Tuesday.
But in an article published
in the state-run People’s Daily
newspaper, Putin said Russia
hoped to export “great quantities” of natural gas to China
in the near future.
“Our joint projects practically change the entire configuration of the global energy
market,” he said.
China rejects French demand on Australia probes
gang of human
Tiananmen prisoners’ release
smugglers
AFP
BEIJING
CHINA on Tuesday dismissed France’s demand for
the release of political prisoners jailed after the 1989
crackdown on Tiananmen
democracy protests, saying it
was strongly opposed to
such “interference”.
France on Monday joined
the United States in calling on
China to release prisoners
jailed 23 years ago after troops
stormed central Beijing, ending six weeks of pro-democracy demonstrations.
“We express our strong
dissatisfaction and firm
opposition to the French
statement,” foreign ministry
spokesman Liu Weimin told
reporters Tuesday.
“This is interference into
China’s internal affairs.”
China still considers the
Tiananmen demonstrations
a “counter-revolutionary
rebellion” and has refused to
acknowledge any wrongdoing or consider compensation for the hundreds, and
perhaps thousands, killed.
France on Monday
joined the United
States in calling
on China to
release prisoners
jailed 23 years
ago after troops
stormed central
Beijing.
On Monday, French foreign ministry spokesman
Bernard Valero said Paris
“wants to see Chinese prisoners of conscience freed”.
“We recall our unwavering
commitment to the defence of
human rights, including the
fundamental right to freedom
of expression, in China and
around the world,” he said.
“The European Union
consistently brings the situation of Tiananmen prisoners
to the attention of the
Chinese authorities.
“(The EU) has called
numerous times for their
early release, which would be
a positive gesture,” he said.
Rights campaigners and
petitioners said on Monday
that Chinese authorities had
rounded up hundreds of
activists in Beijing as they
marked the 23rd anniversary of the June 3-4, 1989
crackdown.
The United States had also
called on China to release prisoners linked to the crackdown,
and Liu gave Washington a
similar rebuke on Monday.
Meanwhile, China said
foreign embassies were act-
ing illegally in issuing their
own air quality readings and
that only the government
could release data on the
nation’s heavy pollution.
China’s cities are among the
world’s most polluted, but
until recently, official air quality measurements regularly
rated their air quality as good
— even as data from the US
embassy in Beijing showed
off-the-chart pollution.
The US embassy air quality Twitter feed gained a
major following in Beijing,
and later in Shanghai when
it was introduced at the US
consulate there.
Beijing announced earlier
this year it would change the
way it measured air quality
to include the smaller particles experts say make up
much of the pollution in
Chinese cities, after a vocal
campaign.
Nigerian plane crash toll rises to 159
AFP
LAGOS
Members of a rescue team carry the remains of a victim of a Dana Air plane crash at the site of the
accident in Toyin Area of Iju Ishaga, near Lagos, on Tuesday. (AFP)
A NIGERIAN passenger jet that
crashed in the country’s largest
city of Lagos killed at least six
people on the ground, raising
the confirmed death toll to 159,
an official said on Tuesday.
Rescue workers were using
a crane to tear down the ruins
of a two-story residential
building, concerned it could
collapse, but stopped when
another corpse was spotted
amid the wreckage.
All 153 people on board the
Dana Air MD83 were killed
when it crashed on Sunday
afternoon, and fears that
death toll may rise are now
centered on the residence
with rescuers uncertain of
how many people were in the
building at the time of impact.
“We have six victims from
the building. Made up of four
residents and two visitors,”
said Femi Oke-Osanyintolu,
who heads the Lagos State
Emergency
Management
Agency.
Chineyere Peace Eweh, 37,
said she was at church when
she received a call that her
home was on fire.
“When I came I saw my flat
burning. This is the only thing
I have left,” the mother of
three explained, pointing to
her clothes. “And my bible.”
She said a member of her
church congregation has
arranged a place for her to stay
temporarily. Officials from the
Lagos state government have
begun registering those whose
homes were destroyed and
have offered to pay for permanent resettlement.
Earlier on Tuesday, other
building residents were
allowed onto the site to salvage property, including one
who spoke of a narrow escape
for himself and two others.
AFP
SYDNEY
AUSTRALIA said on Tuesday
it may revoke the visas of an
alleged people-smuggling
kingpin and six of his associates after reports they were
granted asylum and continued arranging boat trips.
An investigation by ABC
Television claimed an Iraqiborn people-smuggler known
as Captain Emad had travelled to Australia from
Indonesia on a refugee boat
in January 2010.
Arriving under a false
name, he was granted asylum
within three months and
began arranging smuggling
operations
from
the
Australian capital, according
to the broadcast, which aired
on Monday night.
Emad was described as the
“head of the smugglers, the
head of the snake” by an
informant who linked him to a
powerful Indonesian ring
behind two ill-fated boats
which sank before reaching
Australia, killing almost 150
people.
He was sent as part of a
plan to expand the ring’s
operations in Australia, along
with “at least” another six
agents on board his ship who
were also granted refugee
status, the programme said.
The wife of one agent was
also reported to be working
within the government’s
immigration department.
Opposition lawmakers condemned the revelations as a
“catastrophic” failing by
Australia’s intelligence agencies
and an “extraordinary indictment” on the government’s
border security capabilities.
Tantowi Yahya, a member
of the Indonesian parliament’s foreign affairs commission, expressed disappointment, describing people-smuggling as a serious
crime whose victims were
often “young innocent children”.
“It’s ironic that Australia
asks Indonesia repeatedly for
help to eliminate peoplesmuggling networks and yet
grants asylum to the perpetrators,” Yahya told AFP.
“Australia should revoke
their asylum status and visas.
That’s the only right way.”
Though they come in relatively small numbers by global standards, the issue of asylum-seekers is a political hot
potato that dominated
Australian national elections
in 2010 due to a record number of boat arrivals from Asia.
A fresh boat carrying 49
people was intercepted off
Opposition lawmakers condemned the
revelations as a
“catastrophic” failing by Australia’s
intelligence agencies and an
“extraordinary
indictment” on the
government’s border security capabilities.
northern Australia Tuesday,
taking to 50 the number of
vessels to arrive this year, carrying almost 3,800 asylumseekers — on track to rival the
2010 record of 6,555.
Immigration Minister Chris
Bowen said Australian police
had “very considerable” investigations into smuggling activities
locally and abroad, and denied
the allegations undermined
confidence in the system.
Fourteen people-smugglers had already been caught
in Australia and charged,
Bowen said, but would neither confirm nor deny that
Emad or his colleagues were
under investigation prior to
the programme being aired.
“The Australian Federal
Police takes these allegations
seriously and will examine all
information
(including)
information that was publicly
aired last night,” he told Sky
News.
14
Wednesday, June 6, 2012
www.qatar-tribune.com
UNITED STATES
US thought Taliban had nuclear bomb in 2009: Sanger
AFP
WASHINGTON
US PRESIDENT Barack
Obama confronted the ultimate security nightmare
early in his administration
— the possibility that the
Taliban had acquired a
nuclear bomb, according to
a new book published on
Tuesday.
The book, Confront and
Conceal by New York Times
chief Washington correspondent David Sanger, says
Obama was told in a dramatic Oval Office meeting in
early summer 2009 of
‘ambiguous’ evidence supporting such a fear.
Intercepted conversations
between members of the
Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan
led intelligence agencies to
warn the group could have a
bomb, and the CIA picked
up ‘chatter’ of possible
attacks on US cities, the
book said.
But Sanger reports that no
one in the intelligence community could be sure about
the authenticity of the
threat.
Some seasoned analysts
believed that any danger was
more likely to be posed by
nuclear material combined
into a radiological or ‘dirty’
bomb.
Other officials in US spy
agencies believed that there
were serious doubts about
the intelligence, but no one
was willing to ignore the
fears, amid concern about
the security of Pakistan’s
fast growing nuclear arsenal.
Senior Obama administration officials have previously
confided that the fear of a
terrorist or insurgent group
acquiring nuclear materials
is the national security
threat most likely to keep
them awake at night.
Obama has made halting
proliferation a signature of
his presidency and was
instrumental in the debut of
a new global nuclear security
summit, which took place
for the second time in Seoul
in March.
“There are still too many
Intercepted conversations
between members
of the Tehreek-eTaliban Pakistan
led intelligence
agencies to warn
the group could
have a bomb, and
the CIA picked up
‘chatter’ of possible attacks on US
cities, the book
said.
David Sanger
bad actors in search of these
dangerous materials and
these dangerous materials
are still vulnerable in too
many places,” he said in
Seoul, warning that it would
take just a small amount “to
kill hundreds of thousands
of innocent people.”
Senate panel
chief to detail
tax code vision
REUTERS
WASHINGTON
Women cheer during a campaign rally of US President Barack Obama at the Iowa State Fairgrounds, in Des Moines, recently.
(REUTERS)
Obama pushes Congress on
paycheck fairness for women
REUTERS
WASHINGTON
PRESIDENT Barack Obama
urged Congress on Monday to
pass legislation to help
women get equal pay for
equal work, emphasising his
support for an important
issue among female voters
even though it has little
chance of becoming law.
Speaking on the topic of
gender equality, which
Obama’s Democrats have
used to highlight differences
with his Republican rival Mitt
Romney, the president said
the bill could also help the
economy.
“This is more than just
about fairness,” he told a conference call to urge the Senate
to back the Paycheck Fairness
Act. “Women are the breadwinners for a lot of families
and if they’re making less
than men do for the same
Women are the
breadwinners for a
lot of families and
if they’re making
less than men do
for the same work,
families are going
to have to get by
for less money.
BARACK OBAMA
work, families are going to
have to get by for less money.”
The Senate will hold a procedural vote on a motion to
debate the bill. Democratic
leaders are not expected to
get the 60 votes needed to
proceed, a clear sign that the
effort is more about electioneering than law-making.
The White House, pointing
to data that shows American
women making 77 cents for
every dollar earned by men,
says that closing that gap is a
necessity - not a luxury - and
hopes to cement female support for Obama.
Surveys show Obama has
more backing among women
than Romney and Democrats
have aggressively sought to
maintain that edge by advertising what they call a
Republican ‘war on women.’
This came to the fore during
the Republican party’s primary election process, which
picked Romney to challenge
Obama on November 6, high-
lighting hot-button issues like
abortion, women’s reproductive health and Obama’s policy on contraception.
These are all topics that
Democrats see as winners for
Obama among this important
group of voters, who favoured
him heavily in 2008 and
whom he needs to secure a
second White House term.
The Paycheck Fairness Act
would update equal pay laws
by barring employers from
punishing workers who share
information about their pay.
It also would strengthen
remedies for victims of sexbased pay discrimination.
Employers would have to
show that any pay disparities
are based on work-related
factors such as education,
training and experience.
THE chairman of the Senate
tax-writing committee promised to spell out ideas for
revamping the tortuous tax
code next Monday, providing
a glimpse of the influential
lawmaker’s plan for major fiscal decisions looming at the
end of the year.
Senator Max Baucus, the
Finance Committee chairman, will deliver “a vision for
tax reform” on June 11 at the
Bipartisan Policy Centre, his
office said.
Democratic
President
Barack Obama and most lawmakers from both major
political parties say they want
a tax code overhaul, generally
defined as a lowering of rates
coupled with a narrowing of
specialised tax breaks.
The devil will be in the
details, such as how low to
trim rates, which tax breaks
to curb, and whether a
revamp will raise revenue or
not.
While tax reform is expected to take years, several deadlines at the end of the year will
force action on some items particularly expiring individual tax rates enacted under
former president George W.
Bush in 2001 and extended
under Obama.
Democrats and liberal
groups are in a minor scuffle
over that issue after House
Democratic leader Nancy
Pelosi called for a vote on
extending historically low
individual tax rates for only
those with income of less than
$1 million.
Obama and nearly all
Democrats have taken the
stance that the wealthy can
afford to pay more in taxes,
and have called for letting
lower rates lapse for households earning $250,000 or
more.
“This could be meaningful
if Baucus says where the red
line is for him,” said Helen
Fessenden, an investor analyst who watches Congress for
Eurasia Group.
All of the lower individual
tax rates expire at the end of
the year unless Congress acts.
According to Sanger’s
book, Obama decided that
with the 2009 case, he could
not take any chances and
dispatched a nuclear detect
and disablement team to the
region, though not directly
to Pakistan, in case it was
needed.
After several days of tension, Sanger wrote, the
threat dissipated. Pakistan
surveyed its arsenal and
reported that no nuclear
components were missing.
One school of thought
about the incident suggested
that Taliban members had
been hoaxed and bought
material from a third party
that was useless in the manufacture of nuclear weapons.
Other officials believed
that the US National
Security Agency had misunderstood the dialect of
Taliban members on the
intercepts, and been mislead
into believing their worst
fears, the book said.
However, Sanger quoted
one official as saying that
facing a possible nuclear crisis so early in Obama’s presidency “created a lasting
impression on all of us.”
Since the incident, US officials have held regular meetings with members of
Pakistan’s nuclear establishment in neutral locations
like London and Abu Dhabi
to discuss nuclear safety,
Sanger wrote.
California vote
set to kick off
political
scramble
REUTERS
SACRAMENTO
CALIFORNIA voters head
to the polls on Tuesday in a
primary contest set to
launch the biggest political
scramble in the state in at
least a decade following the
redrawing
of
US
Congressional boundaries
and election rule changes.
The changes could set
the stage for head-to-head
face-offs between longtime
incumbents, potentially
from the same party, in
November after a decade of
remarkable stability in the
state’s majority Democratic
delegation in the House of
Representatives.
That stability was a result
of the deliberate creation of
electoral districts to favour
incumbents, a process
known as gerrymandering.
In 263 elections from 2002
to 2010, only one congressional seat changed political party.
“California was totally
locked in on this gerrymandered map,” said Kyle
Kondik, political analyst at
the Centre for Politics at the
University of Virginia.
This time the state put a
non-partisan citizens commission in charge of most of
the redrawing of congressional districts. The number
of districts did not change,
but the boundaries were
adjusted to reflect population shifts since the previous
national census in 2000.
California will also see the
two candidates who get the
most votes advance to the
general
election
in
November, regardless of
party. This means that two
Democrats
or
two
Republicans could be competing for the same congressional seat on November 6.
“With nonpartisan redistricting and this new ‘top
two’ primary system,
California
suddenly
becomes very interesting
and one of the more competitive states in the entire
country,” Kondik said.
A dozen districts that had
once been predictable are
now in play, according to
California
Republican
Party Chairman Tom Del
Beccaro, resulting in heavy
spending as candidates,
some of whom had to move
into their new districts,
introduce themselves to
new constituents.
“This is going to be a
record year for campaign
spending in California,” Del
Beccaro said. “There’s going
to be a dramatic rise in
spending, not only for this
primary but also this fall.”
For first time since 1920,
slowing population growth
meant California did not
add any seats to its 53member congressional delegation, adding even more
uncertainty by matching
incumbents against one
another in some redrawn
districts.
“Short term, this is off the
rails; this is crazy,” said Paul
Mitchell, a Democratic consultant in California.
Redistricting has created a
‘huge leap’ in the number of
districts with more than 50
percent minority voters,
Mitchell said.
Majority-Hispanic legislative districts have increased
from 19 to 29, and California
now has the only majorityAsian district in the continental United States.
Two congressional contests have attracted particular attention with two
longtime
Democratic
incumbents
running
against each other.
Disney to axe junk food ads, promote healthier fare
REUTERS
WASHINGTON
WALT DISNEY Co will stop
accepting some junk food
advertising on its television,
radio and online programmes
intended for children and
launch its own ‘Mickey Check’
label for food it deems to be
nutritious.
Disney Chief Executive Bob
Iger and first lady Michelle
Obama announced the moves
on Tuesday in Washington,
confirming details sources
gave Reuters on Monday.
The move by Disney, which
owns the ABC-TV network
and a host of cable channels,
follows New York Mayor
Michael Bloomberg’s proposal
last week to ban sales of sugary
drinks larger than 16 ounces
(about half a litre) in most
restaurants, theatres, delis and
vending carts throughout the
city to curb obesity.
Nearly one-third of US children are overweight or obese,
and a 2006 Institute of
Medicine report said junkfood marketing contributed
to childhood obesity.
The media and entertainment conglomerate introduced voluntary guidelines in
2006 that prohibited licensing
of Mickey Mouse and other
Disney characters for foods
that do not meet minimum
nutritional requirements.
Nearly one-third of
US children are
overweight or
obese, and a 2006
Institute of
Medicine report
said junk food contributed to childhood obesity.
“We’re taking the next
important step forward by
setting new food advertising
standards for kids,” Iger said.
“The emotional connection
kids have to our characters
and stories gives us a unique
opportunity to continue to
inspire and encourage them to
lead healthier lives,” he said.
Disney plans to cut junk
food advertising during children’s programming on its
networks, including ABC and
Disney XD and its childfocused websites, for foods
that fail to meet minimum
nutrition requirements, the
sources said.
The new guidelines, which
take effect in 2015, set limits
on the number of calories and
amount of fat and added
sugar for main and side dishes and snacks.
“Disney’s announcement is
welcome news to parents and
health experts concerned
about childhood obesity and
nutrition,”
said
Margo
Wootan, nutrition policy
director at the Centre for
Science in the Public Interest.
“This puts Disney ahead of
the pack of media outlets and
should be a wake-up call to
Nickelodeon and Cartoon
Network to do the same,” said
Wootan, whose organisation
has lobbied for better nutrition standards for food eaten
by children.
US first lady Michelle Obama during the programme at the
Newseum, in Washington, on Tuesday. (AFP)
Wednesday, June 6, 2012
US/ AMERICAS
Obama pays tribute to Queen
on diamond jubilee
www.qatar-tribune.com
Paraguay president
confesses fathering
second love-child
AFP
REUTERS
WASHINGTON
ASUNCION
US PRESIDENT Barack
Obama on Tuesday issued
an unusually personal video
tribute to Queen Elizabeth II
on her diamond jubilee, saying he hoped she would continue to “reign supreme for
many years to come.”
In a video posted on the
White House website,
Obama said the 86-year-old
British monarch was a “living witness” to the power
and resilience of America’s
“special relationship” with
Britain in times of plenty
and of hardship.
“While many presidents
and prime ministers have
come and gone, Your
Majesty’s
reign
has
endured,” Obama said,
speaking directly to camera.
Since ascending to the
throne in 1952, the Queen’s
reign has spanned 12 US
presidencies, and she has
made repeated visits to the
United States.
“It is gratifying to know
that the bonds between our
nations remain indispensable to our two countries and
to the world,” Obama said.
“In honour of your sixty
extraordinary years on the
throne, communities across
the Commonwealth have lit
PARAGUAYAN President
Fernando Lugo admitted on
Tuesday fathering a second
child when he was a Roman
Catholic bishop, in an apparent effort to limit damage
from the latest paternity scandal to emerge during his fouryear-old presidency.
Lugo, 61, once known as the
“bishop of the poor,” had confessed to fathering a child
soon after he was elected in
2008.
The boy, who is now about
5 years old, was also conceived before Lugo quit the
church to launch a political
career.
The second case came to
light when a 42-year old
nurse told a newspaper Lugo
was the father of her youngest
child, a 10-year-old boy.
She said she had sought
advice from Lugo over marital problems when he was
bishop in the city of San
Pedro.
Presidential
Secretary
Miguel Lopez Perito, a close
aide to the left-wing leader,
said the case could tarnish
Lugo’s image and would likely be used by the opposition
to criticise the government’s
candidates in a presidential
election next year.
President Barack Obama speaks, in Newton, Iowa, recently.
thousands of jubilee beacons.
“May the light of your
Majesty’s crown continue to
reign supreme for many
years to come.”
Obama’s message was not
without historical curiosity.
The US president, born in
Hawaii to a white American
mother, was the son of a
(AP)
man from Kenya, the country where then princess
Elizabeth was on holiday in
1952 when she learned her
father, King George VI, had
died and she was Queen.
Obama and his wife
Michelle appear to have
forged a personal relationship with the Queen, which
was displayed last year when
Colombia, US seize 2.6
tonnes of cocaine
DPA
BOGOTA
COLOMBIAN
and
US
authorities seized 2.6 tonnes
of cocaine in a joint raid in
the
Pacific
Ocean,
Colombian officials said on
Tuesday.
The Colombian Navy was
told about the drug trafficking move by a US military
ship and then proceeded to
stop a fast-moving speedboat named La Frikitona.
Four Colombians were
arrested. Navy spokespersons noted that Coast Guard
and Naval Aviation officers
were deployed in the raid.
When those on board saw
the officials coming - in an
area about 60 nautical miles
off the Colombian province
of Choco - those on board the
boat started throwing packages overboard.
The Navy managed to
retrieve 130 such packages,
which held a total of 2,637
kilogrammes of cocaine
hydrochloride.
The Navy said the drugs
belonged to the leftist rebel
group Revolutionary Armed
Forces of Colombia, whom
Colombian authorities have
long accused of engaging in
drug trafficking. Colombia is
the world’s biggest producer
of cocaine.
The owners apparently
planned to take the drugs to
Central America, and then
on to the United States.
The drugs that were seized
have an estimated market
value of 67 million dollars.
Colombian female police officers show an assortment of tactical weapons during the 10th Regional
Conference of the International Association of Chiefs of Police, in Medellin, on Monday. (AFP)
she hosted a state visit for
the US president in his wife
and a sumptuous dinner at
Buckingham Palace.
“Your Majesty, on the historic occasion of your diamond jubilee, Michelle and I
send you and all the British
people and members of the
Commonwealth, the heartfelt congratulations of the
American people,” Obama
said.
The US leader sometimes
uses video messages as a
tool of diplomacy, for
instance on issues such as
Darfur, but it is highly
unusual for him to mark a
political or constitutional
landmark in a foreign land
by taking such a step.
15
President Fernando Lugo
Lugo will not seek re-election because Paraguay’s constitution only allows for one
presidential term.
“The president told me it is
his son and I think it’s good
that he has immediately
accepted the recognition,”
Lopez Perito said.
Lugo was also diagnosed
with cancer, from which he
has since recovered, since his
election in 2008 ended six
decades of rule by the conservative Colorado Party.
His pledges to champion
the needs of the poor raised
hopes of change among lowincome Paraguayans. His
reform agenda has stalled,
however, in the face of s t iff
resistance from the opposition-controlled Congress.
Three Peruvian legislators
abandon ruling party
REUTERS
LIMA
THREE legislators have quit
President Ollanta Humala’s
Gana Peru party and more
departures are possible as
his crackdown on anti-mining protests and drift to the
right erode his working
majority in Congress.
The departing lawmakers
on Tuesday accused Humala
of spurning traditional allies
on the left, courting big business and - most importantly
- using force instead of mediation to quell vexing social
conflicts over the spoils of
mineral wealth.
Widespread conflicts over
mineral resources threaten
to delay some of the $50 billion in investments Peru has
lined up for a sector that
drives 60 percent of exports
in one of Latin America’s
fastest-growing economies.
The president’s far-left
father, Isaac Humala, known
for ornery comments and
conspiracy theories, has
called his son a sellout and
warned that his presidency
will be a failure.
The
defections
left
Humala’s party with 43 of
130 seats in Congress.
Though Humala has relied
on 20 seats from the Peru
Posible party for a working
majority, he will now have to
look to the right-wing party
of former President Alberto
Fujimori for help in passing
bills.
Humala won the presidency a year ago by shedding his
hard-line image and recasting himself as a moderate
leftist who could please foreign investors and spread the
country’s growing wealth to
help the poor.
Critics say he has abandoned the left.
“Promises made during
the electoral campaign have
been systematically ignored
by the government,” Javier
Diez Canseco, one of the
three dissident lawmakers,
said in Congress.
Political analyst Fernando
Tuesta said more defections
were likely.
“There will be more departures in the future if the government loses the political
capital to manage severe
social conflicts,” he said in a
column in the newspaper La
Republica.
Despite the party’s tur-
moil, Humala is still the
most popular Peruvian president in decades, with an
approval rating of more than
50 percent in a country
where his predecessors
plumbed lows of less than 10
Promises made
during the electoral campaign
have been systematically ignored by
the government.
JAVIER DIEZ CANSECO
percent in polls.
The economy is growing 6
percent a year, inflation is
low, and the government says
it is investing in poor rural
areas that were overlooked in
a decade-long boom.
Public investments are on
track to rise by 30 percent
this year and social welfare
spending by 60 percent.
Relying on votes from
Fujimori’s party would draw
criticism from the left, but
since taking office Humala
has repeatedly said he has
abandoned any political ide-
ologies to try to lead as a
pragmatist.
Critics say the former military officer is too quick to
rely on authoritarian tactics
and
has
criminalised
protests.
His government has
arrested local political heads
for leading rallies against
mines owned or planned by
global miners Xstrata and
Newmont.
Prime Minister Oscar
Valdes, also a former military
officer, has blamed far-left
ideologies for fomenting the
protests, and some of those
leftist leaders are widely
expected to make their own
presidential bids in 2016.
Humala took office in July
2011, urging mediation to
calm hundreds of disputes
nationwide over the spoils of
natural resources.
Those efforts have averted
some clashes with police who
were sent in to clear roadblocks set by protesters.
But at least 10 people have
died in disputes over natural
resources under his watch.
Similar clashes killed at least
174 during the tenure of
Humala’s predecessor, Alan
Garcia.
New US legislation aims to curb cancer drug shortages
AFP
CHICAGO
A CRITICAL shortage of
generic drugs in the United
States, particularly in cancer
care, could be curbed with
legislation now being hammered out by the US House
and Senate, doctors said on
Monday.
Similar versions have
passed each chamber and
may be reconciled in time for
President Barack Obama to
sign them this month or
next, said a panel of experts
at the American Society of
Clinical Oncology (ASCO)
annual meeting.
The law would require
generic drug makers to pay
user fees to federal regulators
for the first time — a payment
that pharmaceutical companies already make for brand
name drugs — in exchange for
the promise of faster drug
approval.
It would also require manufacturers to notify the US
Food
and
Drug
Administration six months
in advance of any potential
shortage.
However, a provision to
impose cash penalties on
companies that do not com-
ply has gained little traction
on Capitol Hill and is not likely to be included, said Richard
Schilsky, chair of ASCO’s government relations committee.
“We are never exactly sure
when a generic drug is suddenly going to go out of supply and that creates a
tremendous amount of
uncertainty, anxiety for our
patients, (and) great difficulty in planning if you are a
physician,” said Schilsky, a
medical oncologist at the
University of Chicago.
“We have concerns about
the fact that if there are no
teeth in that legislation some
companies may decide not to
report as required,” he said.
But Schilsky said the addition of generic drug user fees
The law would
require generic
drug makers to pay
user fees to federal regulators for
the first time.
for the first time would likely
“bring about 1.5 billion dollars to the FDA in additional
resources over the next several years.
“That should reduce the
review time for a new drug
application to market a
generic drug from about 30
months to 10 months or less,
which would be a huge step
forward in terms of getting
new manufacturers into the
game and getting drugs onto
the market.”
While the shortage situation has improved slightly in
recent months, experts say
the market remains volatile
due to economic concerns
and manufacturing woes that
can suddenly remove a muchneeded cancer drug from the
US market.
The FDA has said the num-
ber of shortages of prescription drugs nearly tripled
between 2005 and 2010.
Often, the drugs affected
are generics that have been
on the market for many years,
and some have no acceptable
medical substitutes, which
can threaten patient care.
“Manufacturing and drug
quality problems have
accounted for and continue
to account for the majority
of drug shortages,” said
Sandra Kweder, deputy
director of the FDA’s Office
of New Drugs.
Kweder said the closure of a
single facility due to quality
problems can spark dozens of
shortages at the same time.
Popular
chemotherapy
drugs Mustargen, paclitaxel,
and fluorouracil are among
those recently affected by
shortages, experts said.
“There have been problems in many of these products with things like particles of glass or metal shavings in the vials. Those are
not quality problems that
can be tolerated on any large
scale or for any individual
patient,” she said.
“No patient should ever be
exposed to risks of those
sorts. It is not acceptable.”
16
Wednesday, June 6, 2012
THE LAST WORD
www.qatar-tribune.com
Activists tell
Bahrain court
of ‘torture’
in custody
QPO to perform
at UN event
in New York
AFP
TRIBUNE NEWS NETWORK
DUBAI
DOHA
THREE leading Bahraini
opposition activists, facing up
to life in jail on charges of plotting to overthrow the monarchy, told their trial on Tuesday
of how they were tortured in
custody, their lawyers said.
The three — Shiite clerics
Abduljalil Muqdad and Saeed
Mirza Mahroos, and the Sunni
head of the secular Waed
group, Ibrahim Sharif — all
demanded that they be freed.
“They all complained of torture during detention,” said a
member of the defence team,
requesting not to be identified.
Sharif gave a lengthy account
of the torture he said he
endured along with other
detainees after he was arrested
on March 17 last year, in the
wake of a deadly crackdown on
Shiite-led
pro-democracy
protests. “We were made to
stand in a line, blindfolded. I
had to go through a complete
body search after they stripped
us naked,” he told the court,
according to Radhi al-Mosawi,
his deputy for political affairs at
Waed, who tweeted Sharif’s
account on Twitter.
Sharif told the court that the
torture “continued for weeks...
including beating, kicking,”
and that masked men spat at
him and insulted and humiliated him, Mosawi tweeted.
The three are part of a group
of 13 activists who are being
retried in a civil court after they
were convicted, along with
seven others who remain at
large, of plotting to topple the
Sunni ruling family.
Another defendant was
acquitted. The prosecution has
dropped charges “related to the
freedom of expression.”
FEC Chairman Dr Saif Ali al Hajari (centre) and officials with winners at WED closing ceremony, in Doha, on Tuesday. (MANEESH BAKSHI)
Awards, paintings, dance mark
end of WED celebrations
CATHERINE W GICHUKI
DOHA
AWARDS, painting exhibition
and dance marked the closing
ceremony
of
World
Environmental Day (WED) at
Souq Waqif on Tuesday.
The celebrations were organised by Friends of the
Environment Centre (FEC) in
association
with
the
International Academy for
Intercultural Development
(IAID). World Environment
Day is observed every year on
June 5 with focus on a special
theme. This year’s theme was
‘Green Economy – does it
include you?’
A painting contest was also
held to commemorate the
environment day which
received over 2000 entries
from 6 different age categories
and from over 50 schools. The
entries were divided into categories A to F and consisted of
participants in the age group
from four to adults.
From each category, the first
three positions received
awards. Besides, 15 runners up
positions were also given
awards. Among the participating schools, Birla Public school
received accolades as the best
participating school.
Speaking on the occasion,
the chairman of the FEC Dr
Saif Ali al Hajari said, “Today
we have to be proud because
we are here to take responsibility for the environment for the
younger generation. We can’t
solve our problems only
through knowledge and technology; we have to transfer the
knowledge to our children.”
He further said, “This is a
year of green economy and we
have to invest in green ventures and it takes responsibility
from families to the leaders
and we have to work as a
team.” he said.
Those awarded for the first
positions in the painting contest included A Maryam Sohail
from Al Khor International
School (category A), L Raman
Kishore from DPS-IMS (category B), Deepak Sajikumar
from MES Indian School (category C), Cut Izza Fildza Alyssa
from Al Khor International
School (category D), JM
Soorya Narayan from MES
Indian School (category E) and
Sauman Pal in the category F.
Thanking sponsors and partners, IAID Centre Manager
and WED Project Manager
Marianne G Indrinal said that
this year was better compared
to last year and the painting
contest was a way to raise
awareness on environment
conservation.
“We decided to come up with
the painting contest so that we
could be able to spread awareness about the environment.
Through the painting contest
we were able to spread awareness among families. This
year’s contest theme was ‘Save
the Environment’. This year
the celebrations were bigger
because we had over 2000
entries in painting contest
alone. Last year we had 1500
entries,” she said.
The WED celebration was
sponsored by Al Khalij
Commercial Bank (Al Khaliji),
Oryx, GTL Limited, Gulf
Agency Company and a number of partners including VCUQatar,
ILoveQatar.net,
Intercontinental hotel, besides
others. Al Khaliji’s head of public relations Abeer al Kalla said
“Everyone can play a role in
environmental awareness. We
must be conscious of the ecological footprints we leave
behind. Although WED is only
held once a year, environmental responsibility is a day-today affair and our lifestyles
should reflect that”.
THE Qatar Philharmonic
Orchestra (QPO) will perform for the first time in New
York as part of a special cultural event to empower
women across the world.
President of the United
Nations General Assembly
HE Nasser Abdulaziz al
Nasser will be hosting the
event in the General
Assembly Hall at 7pm on
Wednesday (June 6).
The QPO, a member of
Qatar
Foundation
for
Education, Science and
Community Development
(QF), has delivered impressive
performances
by
embracing both western and
Arabic music. It serves as a
cross-cultural bridge that
unites people of all nations
and seeks to highlight commonalities through music.
QF is co-sponsoring this
special evening along with
the government of Qatar. It’s
Chairperson Her Highness
Sheikha Moza has consistently worked to improve the lives
of women by facilitating their
progress, and tackling a host
of other critical issues such as
eradication of poverty.
Haya bint Khalifa al
Nasser, QF director of communication, will deliver a
speech to highlight the significant role that the Foundation
has played to support women
and promote culture under
the guidance of HH Sheikha
Moza. “Qatar Foundation
seeks to unlock human
potential and to strengthen
the role of culture in all societies of the world through
various channels, including
music which is considered to
be a universal language that
creates dialogue between different
cultures.
Qatar
Foundation’s participation
through
the
Qatar
Philharmonic Orchestra is a
clear example of the
Foundation’s desire to build
bridges of cultural communication between Qatar and
other countries around the
world,” said Haya.
“HH Sheikha Moza, has
made it her priority to start
cultural debate between communities in addition to facilitating the role of women and
unlocking their potential with
full belief that a woman is at
the heart of family and society. Thanks to these efforts,
women today are involved at
all levels of human activities
in the renaissance which is
taking place in Qatar and the
rest of the region.”
The UN General Assembly
president stressed the essential role of music and culture
in bringing people together to
realise a shared vision. “The
participation of the QPO is
very significant in showing
that music can serve as a
bridge of harmony that can
be used to unite diverse cultures towards this great cause
to help women and girls,” al
Nasser said.
The evening function will
serve a dual purpose - to promote the role of UN Women
(the entity tasked with
increasing gender equality
and women’s empowerment), as well as boosting
support for the UN Trust
Fund to End Violence
Against Women.