SATURDAY 10 APRIL 2021 www.thepeninsula.qa28 SHA'ABAN - 1442 VOLUME 26 NUMBER 8588

Sport | 16

Guardians of world economy

see long road for pandemic

recovery

Al Sadd wrap up dominant QSL campaign with rout of Qatar SC

Business | 13

2 RIYALS

Illuminated Katara welcomes Ramadan

Imprisonment of

minimum one month

and maximum three

years and/or fine of

minimum QR10,000 and

maximum QR50,000 in

case of running away or

trying to run away in

case of any accident or

when the police or

anybody entrusted to

implement the traffic

law gives an order to

stop,” the Ministry of

Interior said.

1 9 9 6 - 2 0 2 1 S I L V E R J U B I L E E Y E A R

My sincere condolences and sympathies to Her

Majesty The Queen, the Royal Family and the

British people on the loss of His Royal Highness

The Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh.

Amir sends condolences to Queen ElizabethQNA — DOHA

Amir H H Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani and Deputy Amir H H Sheikh Abdullah bin Hamad Al Thani sent yesterday cables of condolences to H M Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom on the death of HRH Prince Philip (pictured), Duke of Edinburgh.

Prime Minister and Minister of Interior H E Sheikh Khalid bin Khalifa bin Abdulaziz Al Thani also sent a cable of condolences to Prime Minister of the United Kingdom H E Boris Johnson on the death of HRH Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh.

With only a few days left for the advent of the holy month of Ramadan, Katara Cultural Village has been making arrangements for welcoming it. A view of an illuminated street in Katara. PIC. ABDUL BASIT/ THE PENINSULA

Deputy PM and FM holds phone call with US Secretary of State

QNA — DOHA

Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs H E Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdul-rahman Al Thani held yesterday a phone call with US Secretary of State H E Antony Blinken.

During the call, they reviewed the bilateral coop-eration relations, and the latest developments in the region, especially in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Iran.

The Deputy Prime Min-ister and Minister of Foreign Affairs reiterated, during the call, the State of Qatar’s thanks to the United States of America for resuming eco-nomic, development, and humanitarian assistance to the brotherly Palestinian people.

Labour Ministry

stops evening

services to limit

COVID-19 spread

THE PENINSULA — DOHA

The Ministry of Administrative Devel-opment, Labour and Social Affairs has announced that it will stop providing services in government services complexes during evening.

In a post on Twitter, the Ministry also stated that this decision will take effect from tomorrow (Sunday) until further notice.

The Ministry mentioned that this came in line with the Qatar Cabinet decision to re-impose restrictions to limit the spread of the coronavirus (COVID-19) cases in the country.

Motorists face jail term if they flee accident sceneSIDI MOHAMED THE PENINSULA

The Ministry of Interior has warned drivers from running away in case of any traffic accident as the punishment may reach three years impris-onment.

“ I m p r i s o n m e n t o f minimum one month and maximum three years and/or fine of minimum QR10,000 and maximum QR50,000 in case of running away or trying to run away in case of any accident or when the police or anybody entrusted to implement the traffic law gives an order to stop,” the Ministry of Interior said.

This information was shared by the General Direc-torate of Traffic of the Min-istry of Interior in a recent virtual press conference held under the title ‘Common Traffic Mistakes Among Drivers’. The event was attended by more than 130 participants from different communities in Qatar.

Among other common traffic mistakes committed by motorists is violating red signal. “If a motorist does not abide by the automatic traffic signals, the fine is QR6,000,” the Min-istry noted.

Another important issue is the safety of children and they are more safe only when they are on the rear seats, while some parents allow children under 10 years of age to sit on the front seat. The Ministry said

this is violating traffic rules and violator expose children to danger and also to the fine which is QR500.

Other common traffic mis-takes, the Ministry mentioned, included overtaking from right, not wearing the seat belt while driving, using mobile while driving, blocking intersections and exceeding posted speed limit on the road.

“The fine is QR500 in case the driver using or carrying mobile phone or any other device in hand while driving or becoming busy of watching any visual object from television set in the vehicle or not preventing babies less than 10 years of age from occupying the front seat while driving,” the Ministry said. �P2

MoCI sets health safety guidelines for delivery staffTHE PENINSULA — DOHA

As from yesterday restaurants and cafes stopped offering food and seating facility to customers on their premises, the Ministry of Commerce and Industry (MoCI) has set strict guidelines for delivery companies and staff.

Under new restrictions imposed to curb the spread of second wave of COVID-19 pandemic in the country which came into effect yesterday, food is not allowed to be served indoors or outdoors in restaurants and cafes while delivery and pick-up services can continue.

The Ministry said yesterday

that it has compelled com-panies processing delivery orders to comply with a set of precautionary measures to preserve the safety of citizens and residents.

The companies have been asked to measure the temper-ature of the delivery staff twice

daily and also ensure that the delivery staff commits to the health and safety measures especially wearing masks and frequently sanitizing hands.

The companies have been also asked to note the full name and temperature of the delivery person on each order.

They should also sterilize the means of transportation used to deliver orders. The com-panies have been directed by the Ministry to place the orders in plastic bags that must be disposed of before delivering (items) to the customers.

Last year during restric-tions, the restaurants and online food delivery platforms had started contactless home delivery service to limit the spread of COVID-19. The idea behind the contactless delivery was to avoid any kind of contact between the delivery person and the customer receiving the food item.

Meanwhile other restric-tions imposed by the Cabinet

also came into force yesterday like gathering or sitting that are not allowed in public parks, beaches and the Cor-niche. Cinemas, nurseries, public museums, libraries as well as beauty and hair salons were closed.

The Ministry of Munici-pality and Environment tweeted: “Ministry of Munic-ipality and Environment will be closing Al Khor Park. All individual sports, such as walking, jogging and cycling are permitted in all parks, beaches, and the Corniche. Residents may not gather or sit. And playgrounds, gyms, and bathrooms will remain closed.”

Qatar administers 1,041,632 vaccine dosesTHE PENINSULA — DOHA

The Ministry of Public Health (MoPH) yesterday announced the registration of 950 new confirmed cases of COVID-19. Among them 136 are from trav-ellers returning from abroad.

Also 533 people have recovered from the virus bringing the total number of cases recovered in Qatar to 168,534.

In addition, the Ministry announced two new deaths, aged 48 and 68 years of age, both had a history of chronic

disease and were receiving the necessary medical care.

The Ministry further said that 1,041,632 COVID-19 vaccine doses have been administered since the start of the program.

“Every day, hundreds of people are becoming sick due to the COVID-19 with many requiring admission to hospital to manage their symptoms. Since February 1, the number of people with COVID-19 admitted to hospital has doubled. Qatar’s strict quar-antine policy for returning travelers enabled us to delay

the introduction of new var-iants into this country for several months but we are now seeing positive COVID-19 cases in the region and in Qatar with the new variants from South Africa,” it added.

This new variant, the Min-istry said, is much more conta-gious and spread more easily between people than the existing strain and may be associated with increased severity of disease. “The good news is that the Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna vaccines being used in our vaccination program are

effective against the new var-iants. The pace of the vacci-nation program means that there is finally hope of a gradual return to normal for us here in Qatar and people around the world. But this will not happen in the next few weeks or months.”

It added: “COVID-19 will continue to be a threat to our health for the majority of 2021 and until all eligible members of our population have been vaccinated, we must continue to follow the preventive measures.”

135,002,931 2,921,381 108,672,374TOTAL POSITIVE TOTAL DEATHS TOTAL RECOVERED

COVID-19 GLOBALLY

9501,041,632 168,534

2

NEW CASES

ANNOUNCED

Total vaccine doses administered since the start of the programme

TOTAL

RECOVERIES

NEW DEATHS

IN LAST 24

HOURS

Prince Philip, who was Queen Elizabeth's husband for more than seven decades and helped to modernise the British monarchy and steer the royal family through repeated crises, died yesterday in

London, Reuters reported. He was 99.

The Duke of Edinburgh, as he was officially known, had been by his wife's side throughout her 69-year reign, the longest in British history.

The companies have been asked to measure the temperature of the delivery staff twice daily and also ensure that the delivery staff commits to the health and safety measures especially wearing masks and frequently sanitizing hands.

During that time he earned a rep-utation for a tough, no-nonsense attitude and a propensity for occa-sional gaffes. SEE ALSO PAGE 9

02 SATURDAY 10 APRIL 2021HOME

Communications Minister participates in Arabsat General Assembly meetingTHE PENINSULA — DOHA

Minister of Transport and Communications H E Jassim Saif Ahmed Al Sulaiti partici-pated remotely in the 44th round of the Arab Satellite Communications Organization (Arabsat)’s General Assembly meeting hosted by Jordan.

Attended by several Arab telecommunications and mass communication ministers, the virtual meeting discussed topics on the agenda, including the Board of Directors’ annual report, the balance sheet for the year 2020, the choosing of new

board members and deciding on time and venue for the next Assembly meeting.

New Arab countries given membership of the Arabsat Board of Directors included Mau-ritania, Morocco, Oman and Bahrain.

With a growing fleet of satellites, Arabsat is the only satellite operator in the MENA region offering the full spectrum of broadcast, telecommunications and broadband services.

Qatar's UN mission holds event on autism & COVID-19QNA — NEW YORK

Qatar's Permanent delegation to the United Nations in New York, in cooperation with the permanent missions of the State of Kuwait, Poland, Brazil, Bang-ladesh, South Korea and Autism Speaks, organised a virtual event on COVID-19 and autism and how technology can support the global response and recovery.

The event saw representa-tives from the State of Qatar and a number of states and interna-tional organisations, discuss how to benefit from technology effectively to address the uneven impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the autism com-munity, in addition to the role

partnerships can play in sup-porting families during the ongoing crisis.

Participants said that the COVID-19 pandemic show-cased the importance of digital technology in people’s lives as lockdowns and physical dis-tancing took place in many countries around the world, which led to a reliance on the Internet and other digital tech-nologies to gain access to infor-mation, health and education.

In her speech, Permanent Representative of Qatar to the United Nations H E Ambassador Sheikha Alya Ahmed bin Saif Al Thani highlighted the efforts made by the State of Qatar in 2008 when the global com-munity recognised a world day

for autism, based on a proposal made by Chairperson of Qatar Foundation for Education, Science and Community Devel-opment, H H Sheikha Moza bint Nasser in 2007.

The Ambassador also noted that Doha hosted in June 2019, an international conference to mark the 12th anniversary of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, which

was a prominent event on the role of technology in assisting people with autism.

She praised the achieve-ments of the State of Qatar, which proved leadership in the field research on autism and awareness campaigns, citing the great commitment of the State of Qatar to people with disabil-ities and the legislation intro-duced to protect their rights.

Praise for Qatar's efforts for peace, development through sport QNA — LONDON

The Embassy of the State of Qatar in the United Kingdom recently hosted a virtual seminar on “Sport for Devel-opment and Peace” on the occasion of the International Day of Sport for Development and Peace.

The speakers focused on sports as an empowerment factor for peace-building and development efforts by engaging it in marginalised communities and enabling them to realise their full potential.

The participants praised the efforts exerted by the State of Qatar in this field, emphasising that since the State was granted the rights to host the 2022 World Cup, it has made important efforts to use sport as a catalyst for peace and development.

At the outset of the seminar, Professor Simon Chadwick, Director of the Center for the Eurasian Sports Industry and Professor of the Eurasian Sport

at the Emlyon Business School in France, said that the State of Qatar is working with interna-tional partners to empower ref-ugees and the economically marginalised, and is carrying out reforms to its labour market.

For her part, Reem Al Harami, Second Secretary at the Embassy of Qatar in the United Kingdom, noted that sports has the power to strengthen societies and ties between nations.

She stressed the importance of sport in enhancing a sense of community belonging, espe-cially among those affected by violence and conflict, as well as its importance in responding to the epidemic.

On the other hand, Marco Teixeira, Coordinator of the Global Program for the Imple-mentation for the Doha Decla-ration, shed light on the efforts carried out by the United Nations to use sports as a means to reach out to the youth, and its targeting of the root causes of violence and crime and

protecting the youth through its “Line up Live Up” program.

Teixeira further explained the UNODC’s “five regions” approach to preventing violent extremism, which includes sport.

Massimiliano Montanari, Chief Executive Officer of the International Center for Sport Security, said that discussions about sports, peace and devel-opment usually focus on the activities implemented on ground, which are the end product of a long series of activ-ities and initiatives that ulti-mately lead to their occurrence.

He noted that the interna-tional community, compared to past decades, has now a common approach towards sport and peace, which creates synergy between societies and leads to better results in sport and projects related to development.

Montanari praised the role of Qatar Fund for Development (QFFD) and the Darfur project

lead by Qatar Charity, as a suc-cessful initiative that was part of the broader foreign policy objectives of Qatar to promote peace in the region. He also commended Qatar's broader contributions to the sponsorship of sports and development, adding that whenever his foun-dation contacts Qatari institu-tions to obtain partnership offers, “no one says no.”

Meanwhile, Danyel Reiche, visiting Associate Professor at Georgetown University in Qatar, shed light on the achievements of the Gener-ation Amazing program and praised its role in engaging marginalised communities such as refugees in developing countries and making a pos-itive impact on their commu-nities by sponsoring sport and development. He added that the challenge is to maintain these activities after the tour-nament and that Qatar will do an “exceptional job” if it can maintain its proactive approach in this field.

Pointing to the critical reports of some international media outlets about the situ-ation of expat workers in Qatar, he said that some of these reports were not fair and some of them were not accurate. He noted that Qatar addressed these issues, set a minimum wage and made many other improvements for expat workers.

Ali Abdullah, Vice Director General of Planning at QFFD, said that sport has the potential to promote dialogue, mutual understanding, social inclusion and peace, indicating that it places great value on devel-opment and peace processes.

He added that sport goes beyond borders and connects people from different backgrounds.

He pointed out that QFFD signed in 2018 an agreement with its strategic partners to help IDPs in Darfur aiming at providing a safe and supportive environment for IDPs and rebuilding confidence.

Gaza cash disbursement from tomorrowQNA — GAZA

Chairman of Qatar’s Gaza Reconstruction Committee H E Ambassador Mohammed Al Emadi, has said that the committee, in cooperation with Qatar Fund For Devel-opment, will start the process of disbursing cash assistance to needy families in Gaza Strip tomorrow (Sunday).

Ambassador Al Emadi explained that the grant will be disbursed to 100,000 needy families in the governorates of Gaza Strip, at a rate of $100 per family.

Qatar, Equatorial

Guinea sign

statement to

establish

diplomatic ties

QNA — NEW YORK

The State of Qatar and the Republic of Equatorial Guinea have signed a joint statement to establish diplo-matic relations.

The signing ceremony took place at the head-quarters of the permanent delegation of the State of Qatar to the United Nations in New York.

The statement was signed by Permanent Representative of Qatar to the United Nations H E Ambassador Sheikha Alya Ahmed bin Saif Al Thani, and Permanent Represent-ative of the Republic of Equa-torial Guinea to the United Nations H E Ambassador Anatolio Ndong Mba.

The two sides affirmed their desire to strengthen and develop friendly relations and cooperation in the political, economic, com-mercial and cultural fields, and stressed the importance of establishing bilateral rela-tions in accordance with the principles of the UN Charter, and expressed their confi-dence that the establishment of diplomatic relations between the two countries will contribute to the devel-opment of bilateral cooper-ation and the consolidation of world peace.

QBRI partners with Argus Cognitive, Rush University on autism diagnosis toolTHE PENINSULA — DOHA

Qatar Biomedical Research Institute (QBRI), part of Hamad Bin Khalifa University (HBKU), has signed a collaboration agreement with Argus Cognitive, in association with Rush University, Chicago, USA, that will support the early diagnosis of autism spectrum disorder (ASD).

During the two-year collabo-ration, the organisations will work on a project titled “Digital Pheno-typing for Social Communication Behaviors in Autism Spectrum Disorder” which will utilise machine learning and artificial intelligence (AI) techniques to create an objective diagnostic tool for early detection and diagnosis of autism, using the gold standard diagnostic instrument, the Autism Diagnostic Observation Schedule (ADOS-2), a standardised activity-based assessment for ASD.

The project will be funded by Argus Cognitive, a US-based high-tech IT company that aims to improve medical diagnostics, prognosis, and therapy choices by integrating AI components into medical devices or medical decision support systems.

Dr. Fouad Alshaban (pic-tured), a senior scientist at the Neurological Disorders Research Center (NDRC), QBRI, will be leading the project. His research group at the institute focuses on

applying epidemiological methods to evaluate the burden of ASD on Qatari families and those living in Qatar, through studying the prevalence rates of ASD and all contributing risk factors associated with the disorder.

Speaking about the project, Dr. Alshaban said: “The expe-rience gained through the exe-cution of the eye tracking research project, spearheaded by my research team in collaboration with Cleveland Clinic, enabled us to attract funding from significant foreign companies and institu-tions, working alongside QBRI on other innovative research projects such as the collaboration with Argus Cognitive.”

Dr. Lawrence Stanton, director of the NDRC at QBRI, said: “The overall goal of research on neurological disorders at

NDRC is to make a positive impact on the health of people. Working in partnership with Argus is a major advancement towards this goal.”

Dr. Omar El Agnaf, executive director, QBRI, said: “The collab-oration serves our goal at QBRI of improving early diagnosis and intervention of Autism Spectrum Disorder. We look forward to closely collaborating with Argus Cognitive and Rush University, combining the possibilities created by innovative technol-ogies with the exceptional medical research and scientific capabilities of each organization. The mutually beneficial outcomes will certainly advance our aim at QBRI to transform healthcare in Qatar through innovation in research to support improving the healthcare system.”

Dr. Attila Meretei, president of Argus Cognitive, said: “We are excited to team up with the QBRI team, tap into their deep expe-rience in ASD and evaluate the Argus medical decision support technology in Qatar. This collab-oration will allow us to mirror a parallel study we run in the US, to compare two patient cohorts in separate geographies and to gain a deeper understanding of the signs and symptoms of ASD, and how these may be shaped by differences in language and culture.”

HEC Paris welcomes International Executive MBA Class of 2022THE PENINSULA — DOHA

HEC Paris welcomed its International Exec-utive MBA (EMBA) Class of 2022 at its Doha campus recently. The implementation of inno-vative technology allowed a hybrid classroom format designed to facilitate and enhance the learning experience following the COVID-19 regulations set by the Ministry of Public Health (MoPH).

The incoming cohort of 45 individuals is one of the strongest groups HEC Paris has seen in 10 years. It includes participants from diverse professional backgrounds across a wide range of sectors who have selected to join the International Executive MBA because of the personal development and career accel-eration it offers. The new participants hold top positions in Qatar’s most esteemed com-panies across various sectors such as energy, education, technology, aviation, health, finance, construction, and banking.

The International EMBA has been specially designed for participants looking to enhance their managerial and leadership skills. Throughout the programme, participants are pushed to challenge their idea of business, develop the leadership skills necessary to innovative, and connect with their peers to learn how to adapt to the ever-changing eco-nomic environment.

The orientation session was opened by Dr. Pablo Martin de Holan, Dean of HEC Paris in Qatar.

Welcoming the new cohort, Dr. Martin said, “Learning is always a form of change, and a great learning journey lies ahead of you. The International EMBA programme at HEC Paris in Qatar has been delivering impact and excellence for over a decade. This programme

will help each of you enhance and fine-tune your analytical and strategic decision-making skills. You will leave the programme better equipped to undertake future leadership ini-tiatives with confidence and to tackle the global challenges of the current times more effectively.”

Ranked #3 in the world by the Financial Times in 2020, HEC Paris’s International Exec-utive MBA is a practical and intense pro-gramme that focuses on developing mana-gerial and leadership skills. During the pro-gramme, participants identify critical levers for sustainable business growth and develop the global vision that leaders need to drive corporate success. “Sometimes people ask, as a businessman, what’s your best investment? My EMBA is my best investment. Doing my EMBA with HEC Paris was a life-changing experience for me. Having the ability to learn from the best, and to interact with people with similar backgrounds, was an inspiring expe-rience,” shared Nishad Azeem, CEO, Coastal Qatar, International Executive MBA 2013.

Commenting on her enrollment, Noor Hassan Al Saleh, National Talent Development Senior Manager at Qatar Airways and one of the upcoming EMBA programme participants, said, “The International Executive MBA will enable me to develop my core competencies. More importantly, the programme will train me to adapt to the changing market situation.” The HEC Paris participants benefit from a world-class faculty and a diverse cohort of senior participants, who bring a wealth of prac-tical business experience from a wide spectrum of industries. Each classroom provides a mul-ticultural environment where participants from different backgrounds, countries, and walks of life can share best and next practices.

Minister of Transport and Communications H E Jassim Saif Ahmed Al Sulaiti

H E Ambassador Sheikha Alya Ahmed bin Saif Al Thani

highlighted the efforts made by Qatar in 2008 when the

global community recognised a world day for autism, based

on a proposal made by Chairperson of Qatar Foundation for

Education, Science and Community Development, H H

Sheikha Moza bint Nasser in 2007.

Motorists face jail

term if they flee

accident scene

FROM PAGE 1

Meanwhile, the Ministry also reminded people yes-terday that as per the cabinet decision no more than four people are allowed in a vehicle, including the driver, with the exception of family members residing in the same house.

The cabinet decision included to reduce the number of people who are transported by buses to half capacity of the bus. In a tweet yesterday, MoI also reminded people that “social gatherings and visits in closed places in homes and Majlises are not allowed. A maximum of 5 people are allowed in open spaces therein for those who have completed the COVID-19 vaccine doses.”

W ALRUWAIS : 21o → 26o W ALKHOR : 18o → 32o W DUKHAN : 18o → 32o W WAKRAH : 19o → 32o W MESAIEED : 19o → 32o W ABUSAMRA : 16o → 32o

Hazy to misty at places at first becomes relatively hot daytime with some clouds, mild temperature by night.

Minimum Maximum21

o

C 30o

C

WEATHER TODAY

LOW TIDE 11:17 – 22:46

HIGH TIDE 3:40– 16:22

PRAYER TIMINGSPPPPRAYRRRAAAYARA MMMMIINNNNNNNNNGGGGGGMMMMMMMMMIIINNNNNNGGGGNNNNGGGIINNNNGNNNNNNNNN

PRAYERTIMINGS

FAJRSUNRISE

03.58 am 05.17 am

DHUHR 11.35 am

ISHA 07.26 pmMAGHRIBASR 03.05 pm

05.56 pm

03SATURDAY 10 APRIL 2021 HOME

THIMUN Qatar meet highlights role of youth against climate change THE PENINSULA — DOHA

The world’s youth should “inspire a movement” that drives global action on climate change, delegates have been told as a Qatar Foundation-led international youth conference marked its 10th anniversary in virtual form.

More than 600 young del-egates from seven countries gathered online this week for the annual THIMUN Qatar Con-ference, which sees high school students from the Middle East, Asia, Africa, and Europe ensure the voice of youth is heard on the most crucial conversations shaping global society.

Under the banner of THIMUN Qatar X – Climate Action, this year’s showcase of student agency saw young people aged from 14 to 18 par-ticipate in simulations of 17 United Nations (UN) forums — discussing and debating issues surrounding climate change, reaching resolutions that will now go before influential eyes, and advocating for causes they believe in.

The four-day conference is organised by the THIMUN Qatar

Regional Office — which comes under Qatar Foundation’s Pre-University Education and was jointly established with the THIMUN (The Hague Model United Nations) Foundation — with the COVID-19 pandemic seeing its landmark edition being held virtually, and each of its committees and commis-sions being linked to Sus-tainable Development Goal 13 on climate action.

Speaking at its opening cer-emony, Sama Ayoub, THIMUN Qatar Co-Secretary General, told the conference’s interna-tional youth audience that climate events must stop being referred to as “natural dis-asters”, saying: “It is not natural when science already tells us global warming will induce more intense storms, and when the human species has already profoundly changed the climate.

“Our society cannot afford to procrastinate in tackling climate change. Our society needs to start acting before it is too late. To take action, we need leaders who can inspire a movement — and that is you, as young people. I would go as far

as to say young people are the solution to global climate change.”

Ayoub’s fellow THIMUN Qatar X Co-Secretary General, Rohan Gupta, said: “I hear well-meaning and well-intentioned adults and diplomats say the youth are the future, but the reality is that the youth are

today – we are societal actors, and our actions can effect change. We don’t have to wait until we are adults to make a different; we can start now.”

Simulations during the con-ference included the UN General Assembly, Security Council, World Health Assembly, Environment

Commission, Human Rights Council, and Economic and Social Council.

Meanwhile, THIMUN Qatar X also provided a special training conference for those with no previous experience of Model United Nations (MUN) events, and a Directors Training Institute to support more expe-rienced MUN leaders develop the leadership skills of others.

“THIMUN Qatar is an extraordinarily unique expe-rience, not only as education for advocacy, but also because we connect you to real-life expe-riences and skillsets that nobody else can,” Fatima El-Mahdi, Head of THIMUN Qatar, told delegates at the confer-ence’s opening ceremony.

“We provide a platform for delegates to debate issues on the agenda and bring in actual change-makers to review those resolutions; and encourage del-egates to learn and use the skills they gain at THIMUN Qatar to become advocates and cham-pions causes — student voice.”

THIMUN Qatar X sessions can be viewed on THIMUN Qatar’s YouTube channel.

A participant during THIMUN Qatar Conference opening.

Researchers at WCM-Q study role of proteins in obesityTHE PENINSULA — DOHA

A study of proteins circulating in the bloodstream has iden-tified several proteins that may play a causal role in obesity, making them potential targets for drugs and therapies.

Researchers at Weill Cornell Medicine – Qatar (WCM-Q) examined more than 1,000 proteins in samples taken from individuals in Qatar as part of the Qatar Metabo-lomics Study on Diabetes, alongside data from European studies. In total, more than 4,600 individuals were involved in the three previous studies. The work was con-ducted in collaboration with the German Research Center for Environmental Health.

Using genetics to isolate the relevant proteins, they found that six proteins had a causal relationship with body mass index, even when other lifestyle factors were taken into consideration. Three of those proteins were found to contribute towards obesity, and at the same time, reflect the biological mechanisms resulting from increased body mass index.

The findings do not negate the need for people to avoid smoking, eat balanced diets, and perform exercise, but they do open up the possibility that medicinal interventions may one day be used to mitigate the role that these proteins play.

Dr. Karsten Suhre, pro-fessor of physiology and bio-physics and director of Bioin-formatics Core at WCM-Q said: “Common diseases are a result of a complex interplay between genetics and a broad range of environmental per-turbations. Environmental and lifestyle factors such as diet, physical activity and exposure to toxins can activate highly interacting protein networks, which in turn, may drive molecular mechanisms toward disease. This is likely the case for obesity, where environ-mental contributions to body mass index are well recognized.”

Proteins are the building blocks of the body and WCM-Q has the technology to examine them at a high degree of detail. In addition to finding evidence that six proteins had a causal relationship with obesity, the researchers also identified a further 150 proteins that were significantly associated with a higher body mass index.

Dr. Shaza Zaghlool, research associate in physi-ology and biophysics at WCM-Q, and first author of the paper, said: “Although we could not prove evidence for cau-sality by these proteins, their association with obesity is still important. Such associations provide us with a greater understanding of the biological role that these proteins play in the development of obesity, and ultimately, in the role that obesity plays in the risk of developing diabetes, well beyond the usual lifestyle factors that everyone knows. This increases the possibility of developing drugs and therapies in the future that target obesity on a molecular level, together with the standard therapies like diet and exercise.”

QU integrates 3D design, printing technology into Core CurriculumTHE PENINSULA — DOHA

The Core Curriculum Program at the Deanship of General Studies at Qatar University (QU) introduced several initiatives during the academic year 2020/2021 to support the university’s strategy towards innovation and digital transfor-mation.

Among these initiatives implemented by the pro-gramme is integrating 3D design and printing technology in some university-required courses such as innovation, leadership, and community participation (UNIV 200) and mathematics in society (MATH 105). This comes in line with the programme’s role to unlock stu-dents’ innovation potential and develop their digital competencies.

Commenting on this, Dr. Omar Al Ansari, Vice-President for Academic Affairs, expressed his gratitude towards these ini-tiatives in line with drives related to innovation and digital transformation. Through dig-itally enhanced curricula, the university aspires to be a pio-neering educational institution that provides curricula and

teaching approaches that meet the needs of the next gener-ation. Advanced digital tech-nology such as design tech-nology and 3D printing plays a fundamental role in changing the labour market requirements in the next ten years.

He added that such initia-tives would support achieving the university’s strategic goals. Such initiatives enhance the university’s continued active role towards excellence and maintain its place among the most prestigious universities.

Prof. Dr. Ibrahim Al Kaabi, Dean of General Studies, praised the initiative, in which he confirmed the pivotal role of the Core Curriculum Program. The programme plays a vital role in preparing students and equipping them with skills, abil-ities, and competencies to meet society’s needs.

He explained that such technologies enable them to be aware of the development around them in light of the technological revolution in a challenging world today. Stu-dents must be well educated and qualified for the labour market.

Prof. Rana Sobh, Director of

the Core Curriculum Program, said, “Such initiatives result from a comprehensive devel-opment process for the pro-gramme during the past three years. This includes a series of important changes that would have a positive impact on enhancing student engagement and then improving the educa-tional process and outcomes.”

On the initiative to integrate design technology and 3D printing into the university requirements decisions, Prof. Sobh said the programme had launched this initiative to enable students to design, print and model what they envision to apply what they learned in scientific concepts and theories. It will also open new opportu-nities and horizons to learn about other advanced technol-ogies and the best ways to employ them.

She indicated that the project’s trial implementation was based on two courses that were added as one of the outputs of the development process that took place on the programme, namely Inno-vation, Leadership and Civic Engagement (UNIV 200) and mathematics in society (MATH

105). Dr. Abdul Hamid Ahmed, Course Instructor (Innovation, Leadership and Civic Engagement), said, “The 3D printing experience is a great addition to the course. I learned a lot from this experience as a teacher. It is an opportunity for us to improve our digital com-petencies as teachers, not just develop students. Students are excited to learn more about this technology.”

Professor Sobh said she was

happy with the outcomes of this experience. “3D design and printing are being integrated into more core curriculum courses to achieve the desired goals of helping students gain more insight into the new chal-lenges faced in our society. This comes to activate the effective role that the programme plays to prepare students and equip them with skills, abilities, and competencies that meet soci-ety’s needs and aspirations.”

Students experiencing Integration of 3D design and printing technology into Core Curriculum courses at Qatar University.

HBKU’s CPP discusses need to strengthen Arab families amid pandemicTHE PENINSULA — DOHA

The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on families, women, and children in the Arab region was the focus of an online seminar jointly organised by Hamad Bin Khalifa University (HBKU)’s College of Public Policy (CPP), the College of Education at Sultan Qaboos University, and the Faculty of Social Sciences, Kuwait University.

Academics, researchers, and advocates of family and chil-dren’s issues from Qatar, Kuwait, Oman, Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, Jordan, Morocco, Tunisia, and Egypt discussed the

findings of data collected in 20 Arab countries under the global ‘COVID-19 Family Life Research Study’ initiated at CPP and carried out between March and October 2020.

The cross-cultural study surveyed families in 72 coun-tries to examine the challenges they faced during the pandemic.

The seminar’s expert panel highlighted striking aspects of the study pertaining to different regions in the Arab world. Dis-cussions focused closely on parents’ mental health; child wellbeing, marital relationships, child-parent relationships; family resilience, coping, family

policies, and identified follow-up actions that would strengthen Arab families, including potential collabora-tions to tackle commonalities. The panel included speakers from the Social & Economic Survey Research Institute at Qatar University; the Family Consulting Center (WIFAQ), Qatar; College of Education at Sultan Qaboos University; Faculty of Social Sciences at Kuwait University; Jordan River Foundation; Jazan University, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia; the Social Research Center at the American University in Cairo; University of Tunis; University of Rabat; and the American Uni-

versity of Beirut. The lead principal investi-

gator of the Family Life Study, Dr. Anis Ben Brik, associate pro-fessor at CPP, and founding director of the Program for Social Policy Evaluation and Research (PROSPER), presented the project overview and results.

“Overall, the study confirms that the pandemic has impacted women, children, the elderly, and vulnerable families, including those living in con-flict areas or as refugees in the Arab region, and is shown to have exacerbated the mental health and wellbeing gap and other pre-existing inequalities.

In countries facing political instability or conflict, children’s levels of anxiety are particularly high,” he said.

“The challenges ahead are clear, and they include the need to carry out extensive further research and develop global, regional, and national inter-vention programs to promote mental health. The seminar, therefore, had the additional purpose of bringing together stakeholders in the Arab region who can jointly identify the necessary interventions and use the evidence to inform the design of policy and support for families in the future,” Dr. Brik added.

Fasting diabetic children advised increased monitoring of blood glucose levels THE PENINSULA — DOHA

During Ramadan, diabetic children who are fasting expe-rience blood sugar highs and lows depending on the food they consume, the dose of insulin they take, and the amount of physical activity they perform.

The most important causes of these sugar highs and lows are irregular food intake and failure to adhere to the set schedule of insulin injections.

“All diabetic children should be aware that there is no single path for all children to follow to maintain healthy blood sugar levels. Guidelines differ according to a patient’s health and variations in the timing,

quantity, and quality of food consumed and the activity per-formed,” explained Dr. Noor Hamed, Consultant of Pediatric Endocrinology at Department of Endocrinology and Diabetes at the Hamad Medical Corpo-ration (HMC).

Dr. Noor highlighted two key potential complications for fasting diabetic children during Ramadan; blood sugar levels fall to less than the normal level, i.e., less than 70 mg or 3.9mmol/litre, and increase of blood sugar level to more than the normal level 250 mm or 13.8mmol/litre, which may lead to infection from the Ketone acidity.

Insulin-dependent diabetic children may fast during

Ramadan provided their health is stable before fasting, and they can control their blood sugar levels, so they are close to normal levels.

However, while fasting, dia-betic children should not have repeated periods of low or high blood sugar when fasting, the

physician should choose the type of insulin used, and required dosage based on the patient’s health and the amount of food taken between breaking fast and Suhoor to maintain normal blood sugar level and there should be careful

self-monitoring of blood glucose levels during Ramadan. The diabetic child should measure their blood glucose levels when waking up in the morning and at 12 noon, 4 pm, before breaking the fast, at 10 pm and before Suhoor, and when necessary or on feeling symptoms of low or high blood sugar.

Also, the Suhoor meal should be delayed, which should be taken shortly before Imsak, and take sufficient quan-tities of water and fluids at Iftar and Suhoor. Children with dia-betes who depend on insulin treatment should keep a piece of candy in their pocket to eat when feeling symptoms of low blood sugar so that they can

break their fast immediately.Dr. Noor stressed the need

for diabetic children to always be ready with the glucagon or glucose injection to raise their blood sugar level in very low blood sugar cases.

“Children should stop fasting and break their fast immediately if they feel symptoms of low blood sugar at any time even if little time is left for Iftar. “Avoid fried, fatty foods and sweets because they considerably raise blood sugar levels as they contain higher calories. If they must have some sweets, they need to increase the fast-acting insulin dose, so the blood sugar level rises, and drink more water to prevent high acidity in the blood,” advised Dr. Noor.

Dr. Noor Hamed

The diabetic children should

measure their blood glucose

levels after waking up in the

morning, at 12 noon, at

4pm, before breaking the

fast, at 10pm, before

Suhoor, and when necessary

or feeling symptoms of low

or high blood sugar.

04 SATURDAY 10 APRIL 2021MIDDLE EAST

Iran N-talks see progress despite clash on sanctionsREUTERS — VIENNA/PARIS

Talks to bring Iran and the United States fully back into the 2015 nuclear deal are making progress, delegates said yesterday, but Iranian officials indicated disagrement with Washington over which sanctions it must lift.

The talks, in which European Union officials are shuttling between the remaining parties to the deal and the United States, aim to restore the bargain at the core of the deal - restric-tions on Iran’s nuclear activities in exchange for the lifting of US and other international sanctions.

The United States was the first to renege on that bargain under President Donald Trump, who vehemently opposed the deal and sought to wreck it. He pulled out, reimposed the sanc-tions that were lifted, and brought in many more. Iran responded by breaching many of the nuclear restrictions.

“All Trump sanctions were anti-JCPOA & must be removed-w/o dis-tinction between arbitrary designa-tions,” Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif said on Twitter, referring to the deal by its full name, the Joint Com-prehensive Plan of Action.

The United States says it is pre-pared to lift “sanctions that are incon-sistent with the JCPOA”. While it has declined to elaborate, that appears to

exclude sanctions formally unrelated to nuclear issues covered by the deal.

Whether the statements are opening gambits or more firm positions remains to be seen. European officials said Iran was bargaining hard at the outset. The remaining parties to the accord — Iran, Britain, China, France, Germany and

Russia — met again in Vienna yesterday after talks formally began on Tuesday and they agreed to keep going, Russian and Chinese envoys said.

“The #JCPOA participants took stock of the work done by experts over the last three days and noted with sat-isfaction the initial progress made,”

Mikhail Ulyanov, Russia’s envoy to the United Nations’ International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), said on Twitter after the meeting formally known as the Joint Commission. “The Commission will reconvene next week in order to maintain the positive momentum.”

The deal’s remaining parties have formed two expert-level working groups whose job is to draw up lists of sanctions that the United States will lift and of nuclear restrictions Iran will implement. Their work continues between Joint Commission meetings.

“All parties have narrowed down their differences and we do see the momentum for gradually evolving con-sensus,” Wang Qun, China’s ambassador

to the IAEA, told reporters after the meeting, adding that work would con-tinue next week. Iran’s foreign ministry said in a statement diplomats would meet again on Wednesday in Vienna. Talks are expected to drag on for weeks.

“Given the technical complexity of the nuclear aspects and legal intricacies of sanctions lifting, it would be very optimistic to think a few weeks,” a senior European diplomatic source said. Some diplomats hope agreement can be reached before Iran’s June 18 presidential election or else talks risk being pushed back until later in the year. “Iran is the pace car for progress. If Tehran decides to push forward swiftly before the June presidential elections, the US will almost certainly be receptive,” Henry Rome, an analyst with the Eurasia Group research firm said in a note.

“That would require Iran to com-promise on its sanctions and sequencing demands. If Tehran is unsatisfied with the US position, or if Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei is wary about the political consequences of a diplomatic breakthrough in the midst of a presidential campaign, Tehran will tap the brakes.” Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who has the last say on all state matters, has opposed any gradual easing of sanctions.

Iranian Deputy at Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Abbas Araghchi, and Iran’s ambassador to the UN nuclear watchdog, Kazem Gharibabadi, leave a meeting of the JCPOA Joint Commission, in Vienna, Austria, yesterday.

ANADOLU — ANKARA

Studies for Turkey’s seven COVID-19 vaccine candidates are progressing, with three of them in human trial stage, the country’s vice president said.

During his visit to the clinical research center, Fuat Oktay said that necessary work is being done to start mass production of the vaccine following approval by Turkey’s drug regulatory authority Pharmaceuticals and Medical Devices Agency.

He urged citizens, who do not suffer from a chronic illness and have not received any coronavirus vaccine, to volunteer for the human trials.

Saudi reports 904 COVID-19 cases, nine deaths

Turkey: Three covid vaccines in human trial stage

QNA — RIYADH

Saudi Arabia yesterday reported 904 new coronavirus cases, bringing the total number of cases to 396,758, according to the Saudi Ministry of Health.

The death toll rose to 6,737 after nine new deaths were reported yesterday. The number of recovered COVID-19 cases in the Kingdom rose by 540 to a total 382,198.

Vehicles drive near the grain silo that was damaged during Beirut port explosion, in Beirut, Lebanon, yesterday.

Turkey summons Italian envoy over remarks on ErdoganANADOLU — ANKARA

Turkey’s Foreign Ministry on Thursday summoned the Italian ambassador to condemn the Italian premier’s remarks on the country’s President.

According to a statement, the ambassador was told that Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi’s remarks were against the spirit of the Turkey-Italy alliance. The ministry stressed Draghi should “immediately” take back his “impudent and ugly remarks.”

Faruk Kaymakci, Turkish deputy foreign minister and director of EU affairs, conveyed to the Italian ambassador that Turkey strongly condemned the remarks by the “appointed” Italian premier on President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, a leader who was elected with the highest popular vote in Europe.

Draghi, at a news con-ference earlier on Thursday, called Erdogan a “dictator.”

“I totally disagree with Erdogan’s behaviour. I believe that it wasn’t appropriate behaviour. I was really sorry for the humiliation that (European Commission President Ursula) von der Leyen had to suffer,” the Italian premier said, referring to a seating issue at a

top EU officials’ meeting in Turkey.

“Here the consideration we have to make is that with these — let’s call them what they are — dictators, who however we need to cooperate, is that we must be frank in expressing our diverging views, behaviour and vision of society, but we also need to be ready to cooperate to ensure the interests of our country. We need to find the right balance,” he added.

Turkey’s Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu also slammed the Italian premier’s remarks. “We strongly condemn appointed Italian PM’s unac-ceptable remarks on our elected president, return the impudent remarks,” he said on Twitter.

“While EU Council Pres-ident Michel explained that there was no problem or intention resulting from Turkey regarding the protocol design, Italy’s appointed Prime Minister Draghi’s remarks directed at our President are impudent and baseless. We condemn this expression and expect it to be corrected,” Turkey’s presi-dential spokesman Ibrahim Kalin said.

Turkey’s Communications Director Fahrettin Altun said by describing Erdogan as a

“dictator”, the Italian premier “exceeded the limits.”

Noting that Erdogan was “elected President by the Turkish people with 52%”, Altun said, “We strongly condemn this style which has no place in diplomacy.”

“Those looking for the dic-tator should look at the history of Italy,” he continued.

Vice-President Fuat Oktay also took to Twitter to condemn the Italian premier’s remarks and called on him to apologise.

“I condemn the impudent and indecent statements by Prime Minister Draghi about our President, who has con-sidered the interests of his country and nation throughout his life, objected to any sort of fascism and tutelage and won every election with the high trust of the public,” Oktay said.

There was criticism in some circles on the seating arrangement at Tuesday’s meeting, where the Turkish President and the EU Council head Charles Michel sat down in separate chairs while von der Leyen was initially left standing.

She was then offered a seat on a couch, with Cavusoglu also sitting down on a separate couch opposite her.

Iran frees South Korean ship it held amid dispute over fundsAP — DUBAI

A South Korean oil tanker held for months by Iran amid a dispute over billions of dollars seized by Seoul was freed and sailed away early yesterday, just hours ahead of further talks between Tehran and world powers over its tattered nuclear deal.

MarineTraffic.com data showed the MT Hankuk Chemi leaving Bandar Abbas in the early morning hours. By Friday afternoon, it was off the eastern coast of the United Arab Emirates, having passed safely through the Strait of Hormuz.

South Korea’s Foreign Ministry said Iran released the tanker and its captain after seizing the vessel in January. The ministry says the Hankuk Chemi left an Iranian port at around 6 am local time after completing an administrative process.

Iran’s Foreign Min-istry spokesman, Saeed Khatibzadeh, later con-firmed that Iran had released the vessel.

“At the request of the owner and the Korean

government, the order to release the ship was issued by the prosecutor,” Khatibzadeh was quoted as saying by the state-run Irna news agency.

The ship’s owner, DM Shipping Co. Ltd. of Busan, South Korea, could not be immediately reached for comment.

The Hankuk Chemi had been traveling from a petrochemicals facility in Jubail, Saudi Arabia, to Fujairah in the United Arab Emirates when armed Revolutionary Guard troops stormed the vessel in January and forced the ship to change course and travel to Iran.

Iran had accused the MT Hankuk Chemi of pol-luting the waters in the crucial Strait of Hormuz. But the seizure was widely seen as an attempt to pressure Seoul to release some $7 billion in Iranian assets tied up in South Korean banks amid heavy American sanc-tions on Iran. Iran released the 20-member crew in February, but continued to detain the ship and its captain while demanding that South Korea unlock frozen

Iranian assets. Iran’s Foreign Ministry did not acknowledge the fund dispute when announcing the ship’s release, with Khatibzadeh saying only that the captain and tanker had a clean record in the region.

But an official from South Korea’s Foreign Ministry, speaking on condition of anonymity under regulations, said Seoul’s willingness to resolve the issue of Iranian assets tied up in South Korea “possibly had a positive influence” in Iran’s decision to release the vessel.

The official said Iran had acknowledged South Korea’s attempts to resolve the dispute as it became clear the issue was “not just about South Korea’s ability and efforts alone” and was “inter-twined” with negotiations over the return to Tehran’s foundering nuclear deal. Unfreezing the funds involves the consent of various coun-tries including the US, which in 2018 imposed sweeping sanctions on Iran’s oil and banking sectors.

German firms outline plans for Beirut port reconstructionREUTERS — BEIRUT

German companies set out ambitious multi-billion-dollar plans yesterday to rebuild Beirut’s port and neighbouring districts shattered by an explosion last year which deepened the country’s already dire economic crisis.

The proposal to redevelop the port and create a new res-idential area from the ruins, with a park and beaches, could transform part of the capital

that was devastated by the August 2020 chemical blast.

It could also create 50,000 new jobs and drive billions of dollars of economic activity through regenerating the area, backers said.

But it cannot proceed until Lebanon’s leaders break a political deadlock which has prevented the formation of a new government and stalled economic reforms, which Western countries say must come before aid or investment

flows to the country.“The next step is from the

Lebanese side,” Suheil Mahayni, general manager of Hamburg Port Consulting, which is leading the planned proposals, told a news conference in Beirut held to explain the initial proposals. The plan, presented this week to Lebanon’s care-taker government, includes a variety of proposals costing between $5bn to $15bn, Min-ister of Public Works and Transport Michel Najjar said.

“The #JCPOA participants took stock

of the work done by experts over the

last three days and noted with

satisfaction the initial progress

made,” Mikhail Ulyanov, Russia’s

envoy to the United Nations’

International Atomic Energy Agency

(IAEA), said on Twitter after the

meeting formally known as the Joint

Commission. “The Commission will

reconvene next week in order to

maintain the positive momentum.”

Algerians protest for political change

05SATURDAY 10 APRIL 2021 MIDDLE EAST / AFRICA

Iraq blames public for new virus record, urges vaccinationsAP — BAGHDAD

Iraq’s Health Ministry has warned of “dire consequences” ahead because citizens are not h e e d i n g c o r o n a v i r u s prevention measures, after the country reached a new high in daily infection rates.

Iraq recorded 8,331 new virus cases within a 24-hour period on Wednesday, the highest figure since the ministry began keeping records at the onset of the pandemic last year. That was double the number of new infections from last month, and well ahead of a previous peak of some 6,000 in March.

Death rates are still fairly low relative to new infections. At least 14,606 people have died, from a total of 903,439 cases. The severe spike in case numbers prompted the Health Ministry to issue a grave warning in a statement on Thursday, saying the rise was due to laxity among Iraqis who flout preventative measures.

The statement said public commitment toward heeding virus prevention measures was “almost non-existent in most

regions of Iraq,” where citizens rarely wear face masks and continue to hold large gatherings.

Those who continue to flout prevention measures and instructions “are responsible for the increase in the number of infections,” the statement said. It called on tribal sheikhs, activists and influential figures to speak out and inform the public on the severity of the pandemic.

Iraq began administering vaccines in late March, but rollout has been slow owing to low demand. Many Iraqis are suspicious of the vaccine and few have booked appointments to receive a dose. Rumors of debilitating side-effects have also put many off.

The ministry urged citizens to inoculate, and said vacci-nation was the only way to control the outbreak.

Meanwhile, Kuwaiti Health Ministry yesterday announced 1,477 new coronavirus cases in the past 24 hours, taking the total up to 244,325. The Min-istry also reported ten deaths, raising the total number of deaths to 1,393.

Turkish military jet crashes during trainingAP — ANKARA

A military plane crashed into the sea during a training flight, Turkey’s defence ministry said yesterday, adding that the two pilots were rescued.

The KT-1 type plane crashed off the Aegean coastal town of

Foca, in the western Izmir province, the Ministry of National Defence said. HaberTurk tele-vision and other media reported that the pilots, who ejected safely, were taken to a hospital but were not in serious condition.

The cause of the crash was being investigated, the ministry

said. The ministry cited engine failure as the likely cause. The crash happened two days after a jet belonging to the Turkish Air Force’s “Turkish Stars” aerobatic team crashed in the central province of Konya during training. The pilot died in the crash.

Djibouti votes as president Guelleh seeks a 5th termAP — MOGADISHU

The Horn of African country of Djibouti went to the polls peacefully yesterday as Pres-ident Ismail Omar Guelleh seeks a fifth term in the small but strategically important nation home to military bases for the United States, China and others.

The 73-year-old Guelleh faces just one challenger, the independent candidate and businessman Zakaria Ismail Farah, who halted campaigning early while asserting that he could not do so in safety. In protest, he appeared with his mouth taped shut.

The other opposition boy-cotted the vote. Final results are expected today. There was a heavy police presence around the polls.

Critics call the president a heavy-handed dictator, but others in Djibouti see him as a driving force in the country’s development and relative sta-bility. The country is located on the Red Sea along one of the world’s busiest shipping lanes.

Guelleh has been in power since 1999 after the death of his predecessor, Hassan Guled Aptidon, the country’s first president. Djibouti won inde-pendence from France in 1977.

The president is widely expected to win another team that should be his last, according the constitution, which limits the presidency to those under the age of 75.

Guelleh told reporters days ago that he was no longer inter-ested in power but was merely responding to the will of the people.

“it is my people, the Djibou-tians, who asked me to run again and not leave them for the sake of the prosperity of the nation,” he said.

After voting, the president

said, “May God be praised, it happened in a peaceful way and thank God, the people have participated in a very good way.”

More than 205,000 people are registered to vote in Dji-bouti, which has a population of over 600,000. The country is a mix of ethnic Somali, Afar and Arab.

“In a beautiful way we’re appreciating the voting, every vote and every five years, and today it happened in a beau-tiful way,” said one person at the polls, Naima Yusuf Kahin.

Djibouti’s President Ismael Omar Guelleh casting his ballot during the presidential elections at the Ras-Dika district polling centre in Djibouti, yesterday.

Eleven soldiers

killed in attack in

Nigeria’s Benue

REUTERS — ABUJA

One army officer and 10 soldiers were killed in Nigeria’s Benue state in what a spokesman said was an unpro-voked attack on Thursday.

The army said in a statement that it would “fish out and deal decisively with these bad elements.”

Civilians, in fear of soldiers looking to root out the perpe-trators, were fleeing the Kon-shisha local government where one local leader’s house had been burnt to the ground, sources told Reuters.

The violence in the restive Middle Belt region marked the latest bout of instability in Nigeria, Africa’s most-pop-ulous nation.

On Monday, heavily armed gunman freed more than 1,800 prisoners in the southeast, while armed gangs have kid-napped hundreds of school children in the northwest in recent months and Islamist militants in the northeast have waged a decade-long insurgency.

Troops patrol in the Middle Belt due in part to clashes between farmers and nomadic cattle herders that have killed thousands and displaced half a million over the past decade, according to estimates from French medical charity Medecins Sans Frontieres. Army spokesman Mohammed Yerima said the troops were initially declared missing while on a routine operational task, but a search-and-rescue team later found the bodies.

“Efforts are ongoing to track down the perpetrators of this heinous crime with a view to bringing them to justice,” Yerima said in a statement. Yerima did not immediately reply to further queries about the attack.

Demonstrators shout slogans and hold up signs during a protest demanding political change, in Algiers, Algeria, yesterday.

Tunisia to review COVID-19 curfew in view of RamadanREUTERS — TUNIS

Tunisia’s government will review the 7pm curfew it has brought in to slow COVID-19 infections, after the president and a powerful labour union said yesterday it would hit shops, cafes and restaurants in the month of Ramadan that starts next week.

“The measures will be subject to study after the request of the president, who called for a review of the nightly curfew,” Prime Minister Hichem Mechichi said.

The intervention of Pres-ident Kais Saied and the UGTT union followed a gathering of hundreds of workers in the city of Sousse who said they would keep shops and cafes open, and after protests in Al Kef, Monastir and Mahdia.

Prime Minister Hichem Mechichi’s government announced the tougher health restrictions on Wednesday to combat a surge in new cases, bringing the nightly curfew forward to 7pm from 10pm and barring public gatherings and markets.

Mechichi is expected to hold a meeting today with governors representing all parts of the

country to review the nightly curfew.

So far in Tunisia, 9,136 people have died from COVID-19. The country’s intensive care units are nearly full, while it has only slowly been rolling out a national vac-cination campaign.

During Islam’s holy month of Ramadan, Muslims fast by day and traditionally gather with friends or family in the evenings, frequenting street markets and eating out.

A cafe owners’ syndicate linked to another union, UTICA, said the curfew would leave 400,000 workers without jobs during Ramadan.

The government has said it will give $70 each to thousands of workers in a bid to avoid

social unrest of the kind that broke out across the country in January.

Tunisia faces an unprece-dented financial crisis, with a budgeted fiscal deficit of 11% this year adding to its already large public debt as political infighting complicates work on a reform programme aimed at reassuring foreign lenders.

“There is a scientific side. But there is also a social and economic side... the night time curfew should be reviewed,” President Saied told Mechichi.

Noureddine Taboubi, head of the UGTT union which has a million members, said the decision would hit the vul-nerable and should be reviewed.

UN chief says Sudan-South Sudan dispute will keep UN in AbyeiAP — UNITED NATIONS

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has informed the Security Council that he couldn’t provide options to reduce and terminate the nearly 3,700-strong peacekeeping force in the disputed Abyei region on the Sudan-South Sudan border because of differences between the two countries.

The UN chief said in a letter obtained Thursday by The Asso-ciated Press that because of the different positions on the future of the force in Abyei, known as UNISFA, “no options that would

be minimally acceptable to the parties could be formulated.”

Both Sudan and South Sudan claim ownership of the oil-rich Abyei area. The 2005 peace deal that led to South Sudan’s independence from its northern neighbor in 2011 required both sides to work out the final status of region, but it is still unresolved.

UNISFA has been in Abyei since 2011, and when the Security Council extended its mandate last November it asked the secretary-general to hold joint consultations with Sudan, South Sudan, Ethiopia and other

key parties to discuss an exit strategy and develop options for its reduction.

Guterres said joint consulta-tions could not be held because of the COVID-19 pandemic so he held separate meeting with senior officials in the three coun-tries. He said Sudan’s government expressed the view that despite the security situation remaining volatile in the Abyei area, UNISFA had played an important stabi-lizing role.

Sudan indicated that a reduction in UNISFA’s strength could be considered immedi-ately, “but should proceed

gradually over a one-year period” to allow time for both countries to comply with a 2011 agreement on temporary administrative and security arrangements, he said. It would also enable both sides to consult with the African Union and the regional group IGAD on suc-cessor arrangements.

More than 62,000 refugees from Ethiopia’s embattled Tigray region are now in Sudan, and Guterres said the Khartoum government indicated that should tensions remain high with Ethiopia, it would ask that Ethi-opian troops be withdrawn from

UNISFA and be replaced with a multinational African force. Guterres said South Sudan insisted that security concerns in Abyei and in neighboring Western Kordofan warranted UNISFA’s continued presence.

South Sudanese officials cited as examples the assassi-nation of the Ngok Dinka tribe’s paramount chief in 2013, and the killing of civilians in January and April 2020, by Sudan-allied Misseriya nomads who go to Abyei to find pasture for their cattle, he said. “South Sudan rejected the establishment of joint institutions with the Sudan,

arguing that previous attempts had resulted in two wars in 20078 and 2011 due to a lack of trust between the parties,” Guterres said.

He said Ethiopia believes the premature withdrawal of UNISFA would likely lead the security situation in the Abyei area to deteriorate —a view echoed by the African Union.

Guterres expressed hope that Ethiopia and Sudan resolve their tensions, which would enable UNISFA to maintain its current strength and continued to focus on Abyei’s security and stability as well as monitoring on the border.

Kenya court suspends govt move to close two refugee campsAP — NAIROBI

Kenya’s high court suspended the government move to shut down two camps that hold hundreds of thousands of refugees from war-torn neigh-boring countries.

Justice Antony Mrima issued the temporary order, which will run for 30 days, after former presidential aspirant Peter Gichira filed a legal challenge seeking to

block closure of the two camps.

Kenya’s interior ministry had given the U.N. refugee agency 14 days, which ended Wednesday, to come up with a plan for closing the camps, saying that “there is no room for further negotiations.”

The Dadaab camp in Kenya’s east holds more than 200,000 refugees mainly from Somalia, which has not known peace since the 1991 ouster of

long-time dictator Siad Barre. The Kakuma camp in northern Kenya hosts nearly 200,000 refugees and asylum seekers, the majority from South Sudan’s civil war.

Gichira, who is lawyer, argues that the directive to close the two camps violates Kenya’s constitution as well as interna-tional laws and treaties regarding protection of refugee rights.

“The threatened closure of camps and forced repatriation

offends all those international legal instruments protecting refugees as well as those pro-hibiting torture, cruelty, degrading and inhuman treatment,” Gichira said in his court filing. Any repatriation of refugees should be based on the principle that such people “return to their places of origin voluntarily and without any undue influence or pressure,” he added.

Kenya’s government has

been saying for years that it would like to close the Dadaab camp near the Somalia border, calling it a source of insecurity. Some officials have described it as a recruiting ground for the jihadist rebels of the al-Shabab extremist group and a base for launching violent attacks inside Kenya.

A Kenyan court in 2017 blocked the closure of Dadaab, saying it was not safe for ref-ugees to return to Somalia.

“The measures will be subject to study after the request of the president, who called for a review of the nightly curfew,” Prime Minister Hichem Mechichi said. The intervention of President Kais Saied and the UGTT union followed a gathering of hundreds of workers in the city of Sousse who said they would keep shops and cafes open, and after protests in Al Kef, Monastir and Mahdia.

06 SATURDAY 10 APRIL 2021ASIA

India’s COVID-19 infections, deaths surge as migrants start to flee citiesREUTERS — NEW DELHI India reported another record number of new COVID-19 infections yesterday and daily deaths hit their highest in more than five months, as it battles a second wave of infections and states complain of a persistent vaccine shortage.

Evoking memories of the last national lockdown when tens of thou-sands of people walked on foot back to their homes, hundreds of migrants in badly affected Mumbai packed into trains as bars, malls and restaurants have again been forced to down shutters.

One of those fleeing was Surender Puri, who recently lost his job as a cook at a restaurant in Mumbai’s suburb.

“There is no other option for me except to return because cooking is the only skill I brought to Mumbai,” said Puri, 31, as he waited to board a train back to his village in the country’s east.

The fledgling exodus could also spread the virus to India’s smaller towns and villages. The second surge

has already been faster than the first, which peaked in September last year with 97,000 cases a day.

The world’s second most-populous country reported 131,968 new infec-tions and 780 deaths yesterday — the biggest daily increase in fatalities since mid-October. Most of the cases again came from Maharashtra, where Mumbai is located.

India’s overall caseload has swelled to 13.06 million, the third-highest after the United States and Brazil, and total deaths to 167,642. India’s total number of infections inched closer to Brazil’s 13.28 million.

The government blames the resur-gence mainly on crowding and a

reluctance to wear masks as businesses had nearly fully reopened since Feb-ruary, only to be partially shut down again as case have galloped.

Election rallies, where politicians including Modi and Interior Minister Amit Shah have greeted hundreds of thousands of supporters, most of them not wearing masks, continued this week despite the record surge in cases.

“We all know that it’s because of the casual approach that has been adopted unfortunately by the society and some sort of laxity everywhere in following the discipline of the COVID- appropriate behaviour,” Health Min-ister Harsh Vardhan told a news con-ference, explaining the unexpected spike. He denied on Thursday there was any shortage of shots for the groups eligible for vaccination, with more than 43 million doses in stock or in the pipeline. India has been inocu-lating about 4 million people a day, tough only to those aged over 45 and health and front-line workers.

But several states, which are not ruled by Prime Minister Narendra

Modi’s party, have disputed the min-ister’s claim and said they were rationing vaccines as the federal gov-ernment was not refilling stocks in time. Rahul Gandhi, the face of the main opposition Congress party, blamed the Modi government for exporting tens of millions of vaccine doses instead of focusing on immuni-sations at home.

“Was the export of vaccines also an ‘oversight’, like many other deci-sions of this government, or an effort to garner publicity at the cost of our own citizens?” he asked in a letter to Modi. He also sought for an “imme-diate moratorium on vaccine exports”. The government said on Thursday domestic demand would dictate future shipments but there was no export ban.

People wearing protective masks stand in line at a railway station amidst the spread of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) in Mumbai, India, yesterday.

Indonesian President Joko Widodo speaks to locals during a visit to an area affected by flash floods in East Flores, East Nusa Tenggara province, Indonesia, yesterday.

Indonesia warns of risk of floods from new cycloneREUTERS — JAKARTA Indonesia’s weather agency warned yesterday that a second tropical cyclone in the space of a week could trigger floods and landslides in more central areas after cyclone Seroja killed 163 people in eastern parts of the country.

Rescuers have been searching for missing people and rushing in aid to islands in East Nusa Tenggara province after Seroja lashed the area with rain, floods and landslides on Sunday. The head of Indonesia’s weather agency (BMKG) said a new cyclone, named Odette, was gaining traction and could hit Lampung province on the island of Sumatra, as well as the provinces of East Java and Central Java and the island of Bali.

“People are advised to remain cautious of heavy winds and rains that could happen in some areas and be mindful of threats of floods, land-slides and flash floods,” Dwikorita Karnawati told a news conference.

While Odette was not expected to be as destructive as Seroja, she warned it could generate tidal surges as high as 6 metres (19.7 ft) in the southern Indian Ocean near Java and Bali, urging fishermen to take precautions.

Seroja damaged thousands of homes and displaced over 22,800 people, according to data from Indo-nesia’s national disaster mitigation agency, while 45 people remain missing. President Joko Widodo also flew to East Nusa Tenggara yesterday to survey recovery efforts.

Malaysia’s key opposition bloc nominates Anwar Ibrahim for PMREUTERS — KUALA LUMPUR

Malaysia’s biggest opposition alliance yesterday nominated Anwar Ibrahim to be its prime ministerial candidate for the next general election.

Elections are not due until 2023, but Prime Minister Muhy-iddin Yassin had said earlier this year he would hold polls as soon as it was safe to do so amid the coronavirus pandemic due

to pressure from allies in his ruling coalition.

Muhyiddin, who came to power last year with a slim majority, declared a nationwide emergency in January and sus-pended parliament to focus on fighting the pandemic, though his critics say he did so to stay in power. Pakatan Harapan, the opposition alliance led by Anwar, said in a statement he would be their prime ministerial

candidate for the polls. It again urged Muhyiddin to convene parliament immediately.

The alliance also said it would be open to negotiating and cooperating with any party for the elections “based on the principles and agenda of reform in the interest of the people.” The alliance’s prime ministerial candidate for the last elections in 2018 was veteran politician Mahathir Mohamad. On-off foes

Mahathir and Anwar formed a surprise pact in 2018 to consol-idate opposition efforts to defeat former premier Najib Razak, who was facing cor-ruption allegations over billions of dollars in losses at state fund 1MDB. Najib was convicted last year in a 1MDB-related case. He has denied wrongdoing and is appealing.

Mahathir, who was premier for 22 years until 2003, became

prime minister again in 2018 after winning the elections.

He promised to hand over the premiership to Anwar before the next elections. But their government fell due to infighting last year, allowing Muhyiddin to take over.

The 94-year-old Mahathir started his own party last year after his coalition collapsed, and remains part of the opposition.

Kerry discusses climate challenges in BangladeshAP — DHAKA, BANGLADESH

John Kerry, the special US envoy on climate, said yesterday that President Joe Biden is eager to work with Bangladesh in dealing with the impact of climate change after the United States’ return to the Paris accord.

Kerry arrived in Bangla-desh’s capital, Dhaka, to hear what the low-lying South Asia delta nation has done to cope with weather extremes and rising sea levels ahead of a virtual summit on climate change that Biden is hosting this month. “No one country can solve the problems of climate crisis,” he told reporters after visiting other vulnerable

countries, including the United Arab Emirates and India. Biden returned the US to the Paris agreement on climate change after Donald Trump announced a withdrawal in 2017.

“We’ve the ability to work together now in order to bring technology, research, devel-opment and finance to the table to do what we know we must do,” Kerry said.

Bangladeshi Foreign Min-ister AK Abdul Momen, who appeared with Kerry, took the opportunity to ask for US help in repatriating about 1.1 million Myanmar Rohingya refugees from crowded camps in the border district of Cox’s Bazar, saying they were destroying vast areas of forests. “We hope

that (the) US’s proactive initi-ative can help them for a safe and dignified return, back to their country for a decent living,” he said.

The refugees are victims of widespread persecution in Myanmar, where the military toppled a civilian government in a February 1 coup, and most say it’s unsafe to return.

Kerry also called on Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, who discussed Bangladesh’s interest in producing more hydroe-lectric power, press secretary Ihsanul Karim said.

Karim said Hasina added that the country’s farmers need solar energy for irrigation to reduce the emission of green-house gases. Momen said earlier

that Bangladesh has not suffi-ciently adapted for climate change and needs support from others. “It should be Kerry’s special target,” he was quoted as saying by the United News of Bangladesh news agency.

He said the countries that are most responsible for green-house gas emission should share responsibility for pro-tecting the people vulnerable to the impact of climate change.

The world’s largest man-grove forest, Sundarbans, which straddles the border of Bang-ladesh and India, is especially vulnerable and its famous Bengal tigers are at risk.

Biden has invited 40 world leaders for the April 22-23 summit, including Hasina.

India objects to

US ship’s patrol

without consentAP — NEW DELHI

India yesterday objected to a US Navy ship conducting a “freedom of navigation” patrol in its exclusive economic zone without its prior consent.

“We have conveyed our concerns regarding this passage through our EEZ to the government of USA through diplomatic channels,’’ External Affairs Ministry spokesperson Arindam Bagchi said.

The US 7th Fleet said in a statement earlier that the USS John Paul Jones on Wednesday “asserted navigational rights and freedoms approximately 130 nautical miles west of the Lakshadweep Islands, inside India’s exclusive economic zone, without requesting India’s prior consent, con-sistent with international law.”

It said India’s requirement that countries receive prior consent for military operations in its EEZ was “inconsistent with international law” and that the United States “will fly, sail and operate wherever international law allows.’’ Bagchi said the vessel was monitored continuously as it sailed from the Persian Gulf toward the Malacca Strait.

Nepal battles worst forest fires in years as air quality dropsREUTERS — KATHMANDU

Nepal is battling its worst forest fires in years, officials said yesterday, with smoke wafting across its mountains and souring the air as it settles into the bowl that holds capital city Kathmandu.

Five people have died so far trying to put out the fires that have been raging since January, said Sundar Sharma, a senior official of the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Authority.

Wild fires were burning in at least 60 places across 22 of Nepal’s 77 admin-istrative districts, he said, adding to the growing levels of pollution across the country that lies nestled between India and the Tibet region of China.

Details on losses from the fires are

still being collected, Sharma said. This has been the worst fire season by number since 2012, when the

government started keeping records.

“Forest fires are the main reason for the rising air pol-lution in Kathmandu and many other places,” Sharma said. “Wild fires could hit the peak later this month if the ongoing dry spell continued,” he said. Nepal ordered schools to close for four days at the end of March after air pol-lution climbed to hazardous levels, forcing millions of stu-dents to stay home.

Forest fires often erupt in Nepal during the January-May

dry season, when villagers burn dry leaves in the woodlands to prompt fresh grass growth for their cattle.

Sharma said the number of fires this year were 15 times more than those occurring in 2020. He didn’t immedi-ately have a reason for the increase.

In Makwanpur, 50 km south of Kath-mandu, 46-year-old Tara Pakhrin watched the fires on a hill next to her home. “The smoke blinded me and I could not see who started the fire,” she said. The air quality index (AQI) in Kath-mandu was at an unhealthy level of 174 on Friday, according to data published on iqair.com, a site that monitors air quality. An AQI level below 50 is con-sidered good.

“The pollution levels have come down in many places but this is not ade-quate enough for healthy breathing,” said Indu Bikram Joshi, a spokesman for the Department of Environment.

Smoke rises from a forest fire on the outskirts of Kathmandu, Nepal, on Thursday.

Eid travel ban in

Indonesia over

COVID-19 fearsREUTERS — JAKARTA Indonesia on Thursday announced an internal travel ban during next month’s Eid Al Fitr celebrations, in an effort to prevent large-scale trans-mission of the coronavirus, a transport official said.

The world’s most populous Muslim-majority nation is gearing up for the start of the holy month of Ramadan next week as it continues to battle one of Asia’s highest rates of transmission of COVID-19.

The halt on sea, land, air and rail travel for the May 6 to 17 holiday adds to a ban announced last month by Indonesia on the mass exodus tradition, locally known as “mudik”, where vast numbers of people head en masse to their home provinces.

About 27 mill ion respondents of a transport ministry survey said they would “mudik” even with a ban in place, said transport ministry spokeswoman Adita Irawati when announcing the travel curbs.

Indonesia has reported more than 1.55 million known coronavirus cases and 42,200 deaths.

Exempt from the travel ban will be diplomatic trav-ellers, workers who have received approval from their superiors, and travel to see ailing family members or for bereavement reasons.

Cambodia sees

daily record

COVID-19 cases

REUTERS — PHNOM PENH

Cambodia reported a daily record 576 new COVID-19 cases yesterday, in a spike in infections since an outbreak detected seven weeks ago that has seen a seven-fold increase in its overall case tally.

Cambodia until recently had one of the world’s smallest coronavirus case totals but the outbreak first detected in late February has led to its first 24 COVID-19 deaths and a climb in infections to 3,604. The gov-ernment has restricted travel between provinces and cities, banned large gatherings and imposed a curfew in Phnom Penh for two weeks.

India’s overall caseload has

swelled to 13.06 million, the

third-highest after the United

States and Brazil, and total

deaths to 167,642.

07SATURDAY 10 APRIL 2021 ASIA

Japan imposes new virus measures in Tokyo ahead of OlympicsAP — TOKYO

Japan announced yesterday that it will raise the coronavirus alert level in Tokyo to allow tougher measures to curb the rapid spread of a more conta-gious variant ahead of the Summer Olympics.

Japan’s national vaccination drive has lagged and most people in the capital still have not been inoculated as infections have surged.

The raised status announced by Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga will allow Tokyo’s governor to mandate shorter opening hours for restaurants, along with punishments for violators and compensation for those who comply. The measures are to begin on Monday and continue through May 11.

Suga also raised the alert level for Kyoto in western Japan and the southern island prefecture of Okinawa, where cases have surged in recent weeks. The new status there is to

continue through May 5, the end of Japan’s “Golden Week” holidays, to dis-courage traveling.

“We will do everything to contain infections within the affected areas and prevent them from spreading across the country,” Suga told reporters.

Under the measures, people are urged to avoid nonessential travel outside their cities, health officials will patrol restaurants to ensure safety measures are observed, and testing will be increased at elderly care facilities, Suga said.

Tokyo Governor Yuriko Koike asked residents to avoid nonessential trips and practice social distancing. She asked restaurants in many areas of the prefecture to close at 8pm.

“In order to protect the medical systems in Tokyo, we have to work much harder to further reduce the movement of people,” Koike said. “We must curb the infections so we don’t have another resurgence at the time

of the Olympics.” “We must endure this difficult time until vaccines are widely available,” she added.

The alert status was also raised on

Monday for parts of three other prefectures — Osaka, neighboring Hyogo and Miyagi in the north. They have had sharp increases in daily cases since early March, soon after Japan scaled down a partial and non-binding state of emergency that began in January.

With Friday’s additions, 15 cities in the six prefectures, including downtown Tokyo, are designated for elevated virus measures.

The steps come less than three weeks after the emergency was lifted for Tokyo, underscoring the difficulty of balancing anti-virus measures and the economy. Suga’s government has been criticised for being too slow in enacting anti-virus measures out of a reluctance to further damage the pan-demic-hit economy.

The new alert status come with binding orders but only for businesses to close early while measures for the residents are only requests, and some experts are sceptical about their effect.

Just over 1 million people in Japan, or less than 1% of the population, have received the first of two vaccine doses, and the surge in cases may cause further cancellations of Olympic-related events. Inoculations started in mid-February for medical workers. Elderly people are scheduled to get their shots starting next week through late June. The rest of the population is likely to have to wait until about July.

Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga speaks during a government task force meeting at the prime minister’s office, Tokyo, yesterday.

Moon hails prototype fighter jet as ‘new era’ of defence independenceREUTERS — SEOUL

South Korea unveiled a prototype of its first domestically developed fighter jet yesterday and President Moon Jae-in hailed the KF-X as the future backbone of the air force and a step toward the US ally’s greater military independence.

The next-generation aircraft developed by Korea Aerospace Indus-tries Ltd (KAI) is designed to be a cheaper, less-stealthy alternative to the US-built F-35, on which South Korea relies. The display at the KAI head-quarters in the southern city of Sacheon was attended by Moon and representa-tives from Indonesia, which partnered with South Korea on the project.

“A new era of independent defence has begun,” Moon said, according to a transcript of his comments released by his office. The advantages of having a domestically produced fighter could not be overstated, he added.

“Whenever we need it, we can make it.” Moon has sought to boost the defence industry, both as a way to spur economic

growth through exports, as well as to chart a more independent path in a country that has relied heavily on its major ally, the United States.

South Korea continues to buy large amounts of military hardware from the United States but under Moon the mil-itary announced its “acquisition policy will change to centre around domestic R&D rather than overseas purchases”.

KAI plans to carry out ground testing this year, with first flights expected in 2022. The plan is to eventually replace most of South Korea’s older, US-made F-4 and F-5 fighter jets, and produce more for export.

Moon said South Korea would have at least 40 of the new jets combat-ready by 2028, and 120 by 2032.

When deployed by the South Korean military, the aircraft will be known as the KF-21 Boramae.

South Korea and Indonesia agreed in 2014 to jointly develop the fighter in a project worth 7.5 trillion won ($6.3bn), with Indonesia paying 20% of the cost. But in 2018, Jakarta sought to

renegotiate to take pressure off its foreign reserves, later seeking to barter for its share of the cost.

Indonesian Defence Minister Prabowo Subianto discussed the issue with Foreign Minister Chung Eui-yong during a visit to Seoul, with both sides agreeing to hold high-level talks about

security cooperation, South Korea’s foreign ministry said in a statement, without elaborating on the cost dispute.

Indonesia’s Defence Ministry did not mention the project or funding but noted in a statement that the two countries had agreed to deepen cooperation, including in the defence industry.

President Moon Jae-in delivers speech in front of a prototype of the country’s first homegrown fighter jet during its rollout ceremony in Sacheon, South Korea, yesterday.

Off to space station The Soyuz MS-18 spacecraft carrying the crew formed of Mark Vande Hei of NASA and cosmonauts Oleg Novitskiy and Pyotr Dubrov of Roscosmos blasts off to the International Space Station from the launchpad at the Baikonur Cosmodrome, Kazakhstan, yesterday.

Australia to buy extra 20 million Pfizer vaccine dosesAP — CANBERRA, AUSTRALIA

Australia said yesterday that it has finalised a deal to buy an extra 20 million doses of the Pfizer vaccine as it rapidly pivots away from its earlier plan to rely mainly on the AstraZeneca vaccine.

Prime Minister Scott Mor-rison announced the deal just hours after saying Australia would stop using the Astra-Zeneca vaccine for people aged under 50.

He said the deal means Australia will get a total of 40 million doses of the Pfizer vaccine by the end of the year, enough to inoculate 20 million people in the nation of 26 million.

Australia’s pivot came after the European Medicines Agency said this week it had found a “possible link” between the AstraZeneca vaccine and rare blood clots, though regu-lators in the United Kingdom and the European Union emphasized that the benefits of receiving the vaccine con-tinue to outweigh the risks for

most people.After the European agency’s

declaration, Australian drug regulators held a series of urgent meetings Thursday and recommended the Pfizer vaccine become the preferred vaccine for people under 50.

Morrison said there was no prohibition on the AstraZeneca vaccine and the risk of side effects was remote. He said the change was being made out of an abundance of caution.

The pivot represents a sig-nificant shift in Australia’s overall approach and is likely to delay plans to have eve-rybody inoculated by October.

A major part of Australia’s strategy had been the ability to make its own vaccines at home and not rely on shipments from abroad. It had planned to man-ufacture some 50 million doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine, enough for 25 million people. Australia had made no plans to make any other vaccines at home.

So far, Australia has admin-istered just over 1 million vaccine doses.

Bodies of 16

Pakistan miners

missing since

2011 found

AP — PESHAWAR, PAKISTAN

Pakistani police said they found a mass grave yesterday containing the bodies of 16 coal miners who went missing in the country’s northwest a decade ago and were believed abducted by militants.

The miners went missing in 2011 while on their way to work at a mine in the district of Kohat, bout 75 kilometres (45 miles) south of Peshawar, the provincial capital of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa p r o v i n c e b o r d e r i n g Afghanistan.

No one had claimed to have abducted the miners but militant groups were active in the area at the time.

Forensic experts carried out the exhumations after a villager in the remote moun-tainous area alerted them to what he assumed was a burial site, said police official Aleem Khan.

Family members of the victims were able to identify the bodies from the clothes and remains, Khan said, and the remains were handed over to the families for burial.

The miners were from the town of Shangla in Swat Valley.

Khan said police would continue investigating the deaths to try to determine who killed the miners.

Although attacks on miners and other labourers are common in the south-w e s t e r n B a l o c h i s t a n province, such violence is rare elsewhere in Pakistan.

Earlier this year in Balo-chistan, militants from the Islamic State group abducted and killed 11 coal miners.

Mining accidents

kill 10 in China

amid safety

crackdown

AP — BEIJING

Nine workers were killed in northern China during an operation to destroy expired mining explosives, while one miner died and seven others were reportedly trapped by an explosion in a mine in the country’s southwest, under-scoring the country’s chal-lenges as it attempts to improve industrial safety.

The blast in Hebei province that borders the capital, Beijing, left three other workers injured on Wednesday, the Chicheng county government said in a notice on its microblog.

The workers had been part of a crew tasked with destroying the explosives, which can become unstable over time and unsafe to use. They had been stored by a Beijing-based coal mining company, according to media reports. The Chicheng county government notice said an investigation has begun into the cause of the accident, which comes amid a push to improve safety in China’s mining industry, one of the world’s deadliest, due in part to the mishandling of mate-rials. Increased supervision has reduced the number of major deadly accidents, although high demand for raw materials, especially coal, con-tinues to lead to safety lapses.

Separately, one miner was killed and seven others were trapped after accumulated gas ignited in Guizhou province yesterday morning, according to state media. Rescue opera-tions were underway, the reports said.

The safety crackdown was ordered last year after two accidents in mountainous southwestern Chongqing killed 39 miners. Despite that, 10 workers were killed at a gold mine in the northern province of Shandong in January after a cave-in caused by the improper storage and use of explosives.

Kim compares N Korea’s economic woes to 1990s famineAP — SEOUL, SOUTH KOREA

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has called for waging another “arduous march” to fight severe economic diffi-culties, for the first time comparing them to a 1990s famine that killed hundreds of thousands.

Kim had previously said his country faces the “worst-ever” situation due to several factors, including the coronavirus pan-demic, US-led sanctions and heavy flooding last summer. But it’s the first time he publicly drew parallel with the deadly famine.

North Korea monitoring groups haven’t detected any signs of mass starvation or a humanitarian disaster. But Kim’s comments still suggest how seriously he views the current difficulties — which foreign observers say are the

biggest test of his nine-year rule. “There are many obstacles and difficulties ahead of us, and so our struggle for carrying out the decisions of the Eighth Party Congress would not be all plain sailing,” Kim told lower-level ruling party members on Thursday, according to the Korean Central News Agency.

“I made up my mind to ask the WPK (Workers’ Party of Korea) organiSations at all levels, including its Central Committee and the cell secre-taries of the entire party, to wage another more difficult ‘arduous march’ in order to relieve our people of the diffi-culty, even a little,” Kim said.

The term “arduous march” is a euphemism that North Koreans use to describe the struggles during the 1990s famine, which was precipitated by the loss of Soviet assistance, decades of mismanagement

and natural disasters. The exact death toll isn’t clear, varying from hundreds of thousands to 2 million to 3 million, and North Korea depended on interna-tional aid for years to feed its people.

Kim’s speech came at the closing ceremony of a party meeting with thousands of grassroots members, called cell secretaries. During his opening day speech on Tuesday, Kim said improving public liveli-hoods in the face of the “worst-ever situation” would depend on the party cells.

During the party congress in January, Kim ordered offi-cials to build stronger self-sup-porting economy, reduce reliance on imports and make more consumer goods. But ana-lysts are sceptical about Kim’s push, saying the North’s problems are the result of poor management, self-imposed

isolation and sanctions over his nuclear program.

Chinese data show North Korea’s trade with China, its biggest trading partner and aid benefactor, shrank by about 80% last year following North Korea’s border closure as part of stringent pandemic measures. Experts say North Korea has no other option because a major coronavirus outbreak could have dire con-sequences on its broken health care system. Cha Deok-cheol, deputy spokesman at South Korea’s Unification Ministry, told reporters on Friday that there are multiple signs that North Korea is taking steps to ease control on its border with China, including the North’s own reports that it established new anti-virus facilities on the border and passed new laws on the disinfection of imported goods.

China reports 21

new mainland

COVID-19 cases

REUTERS — BEIJING

China reported 21 new COVID-19 cases on April 8, down from 24 cases a day earlier, the country’s national health authority said yesterday.

The National Health Commission, in a statement, said eight of the new cases were local infections, all of which were reported in southwestern Yunnan province.

Ruili, a city in Yunnan on the border with Myanmar, is dealing with a new cluster of infections and rolled out various measures including home quarantine and vacci-nation drives to contain the disease.

The number of new asymptomatic cases, which China does not classify as confirmed cases, rose to 12 from six a day earlier.

The total number of con-firmed COVID-19 cases in Mainland China now stands at 90,386, while the death toll remained unchanged at 4,636.

The new alert status come

with binding orders but

only for businesses to

close early while measures

for the residents are only

requests.

08 SATURDAY 10 APRIL 2021VIEWS

CHAIRMANDR. KHALID BIN THANI AL THANI

EDITOR-IN-CHIEFDR. KHALID BIN MUBARAK AL-SHAFI

editorinchief@pen.com.qa

ACTING MANAGING EDITORMOHAMMED SALIM MOHAMED

m.salim@pen.com.qa

DEPUTY MANAGING EDITORMOHAMMED OSMAN ALI osman@pen.com.qa

EDITORIAL

BEING a responsible state, Qatar, in recent years, has taken many steps and launched many green initiatives to protect the earth from growing threat of climate change.

In September 2019, Amir H H Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani announced the State of Qatar’s con-tribution of $100m for the support of small developing island states and the least developed states to deal with the climate change, natural hazards, environmental challenges and to build the capacity to counter their destructive effects.

An important tool in nations’ fight against climate change is recycling of waste material that definitely lowers the dangerous burden on natural environment and Qatar is fully employing this tool.

The holding of 1st International Conference on Waste Management by the Ministry of Municipality and Envi-ronment (MME) last week was the continuity of Qatar’s efforts towards environment protection.

A number of governmental institutions, private sector and local factories, some external parties, a group of experts and local and international specialists in the waste management and treatment participated in the conference.

According to official figures released ahead of con-ference, 434,000 tonnes of building materials were pro-duced by recycling construction waste in 2020. Also 482,402 tyres were also processed in the same year.

Qatar’s National Development Strategy Goals 2018-2022 include encouraging and supporting the private sector to pursue recycling projects for all types of wastes; devising a plan to manage solid waste which would emphasise country’ recycling strategy and handle hazardous waste and substances.

Raising the percentage of the utilisation of recycled materials to 20 percent by the end of 2022 and recy-cling 15 percent of all generated waste by the end of 2022 are also part of strategy.

In his speech at the opening of the conference, Min-ister of Municipality and Environment H E Eng. Abdullah bin Abdulaziz bin Turki Al Subaie said Qatar has adopted a comprehensive plan to manage and recycle this waste by establishing a waste management and treatment centre in Mesaieed, which is one of the largest centres in the region, as well as meet environmental safety requirements in terms of treating waste in a modern and safe manner.

Meanwhile to promote use of recycled materials in projects, Ashghal Research and Development Center run by the Quality and Safety Department has prepared the Ashghal Recycling Manual.

No doubt that in coming years Qatar will be a leader in the region in terms of sustainable management of waste and will reduce hazards to environment signifi-cantly presenting a model for other countries.

Reducing the hazards

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Quote of the day

Every year, land mines, explosive remnants of war

and improvised explosive devices claim nearly 10,000

casualties, mostly civilian, and children in conflict areas.

It is a reminder of the long-lasting, destabilising effects

to post conflict peace-building and sustainable peace.

Bui Thanh Son, Vietnam Foreign Minister

US Special Presidential Envoy for Climate, John Kerry, speaking during a visit to Jubail Mangrove Park in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, recently.

More than 7,000 miles from Washington, John Kerry arrived in yet another major capital to deliver a message and a plea: The United States plans to make a profound push to combat climate change in the months and years ahead, and it needs all the partners it can get.

In an interview here, Pres-ident Joe Biden’s special envoy for climate said it is a message he has been deliv-ering with “humility for four years that have been wasted.” After the Trump adminis-tration aggressively rolled back policies to limit climate change and made the United States the only nation to withdraw from the Paris climate accord, Biden has made reversing those moves a central part of his presidency.

Kerry said that as cata-strophic impacts of climate change have become more tangible and more frequent, the urgency of the problem means that countries must work together to confront it, or else face a “mutual suicide pact across the planet.” The problem remains solvable, but it “depends entirely on the political will,” and that the United States under Biden plans to lead by example, he said.

Exactly what that example might look like will take shape later this month, when Biden convenes dozens of world leaders for a virtual Earth Day summit. He is expected to unveil a new, more ambitious plan to cut US greenhouse gas emissions between now and 2030 - likely in the neigh-borhood of 50 percent com-pared to 2005 levels.

Whether that goal becomes a reality remains uncertain, and will depend at least in part on what initia-tives Congress is willing to fund and what policies future administrations pursue. Still, the moment is aimed at rees-tablishing American lead-ership in the fight to limit the Earth’s warming to no more than 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 Fahrenheit) compared with preindustrial levels - a threshold beyond which sci-entists predict irreversible environmental damage.

That US promise and the policies that underpin it, the administration hopes, will help compel other

large-emitting countries around the world to step up their own efforts and cement enhanced national pledges ahead of a key United Nations climate conference this fall in Scotland.

That’s why even amid an ongoing pandemic, Kerry has spent significant time in the run up to the Earth Day summit visiting leaders who will play critical roles in whether the world can mean-ingfully alter its current tra-jectory, which scientists agree is woefully inadequate and could lead to ever deepening climate-related crises in coming decades.

Kerry traveled to Europe last month to meet with allies in London, Brussels and Paris, in hopes of forging a coalition that could push other nations to move more quickly. His trip to Asia this week includes stops in three countries: India, Bangladesh and the United Arab Emirates. He also plans to visit China, the world’s largest emitter of greenhouse gases, at a later date.

The travel is a way to convey the Biden administra-tion’s sense of urgency about the problem and the presi-dent’s determination to renew relationships ahead of the global gathering in Glasgow in November. India is currently reporting record numbers of coronavirus cases, but Kerry spent three full days in the country consulting with political leaders, business executives and entrepreneurs.

Meeting people in person allows “greater ease in the give and take,” he said in the interview. It also gives the ability to pull someone aside

and “whisper in their ear” something “you don’t want other people necessarily to hear.” India is a crucial player in the fight to curb global emissions. It is currently the third-largest emitter of carbon dioxide in the world, and such emissions are expected to grow rapidly as incomes and energy con-sumption rise in a nation of more than 1.3 billion people.

It is one of few nations on track to meet its commit-ments under the Paris accord, Kerry noted. The Indian gov-ernment has set a goal of installing 450 gigawatts of renewable energy capacity by 2030. If India makes progress toward that target, Kerry said, it will automatically pull the country away from some of its dependency on fossil fuels.

India isn’t “using coal because they like coal or they’re oblivious to the impact,” Kerry said. “If they can find a way to finance an alternative, they’ll leap at it.” Still, like the United States and virtually every other major economy, change is not yet happening quickly enough. Climate Action Tracker, an independent group that analyses what cuts countries have vowed to take and how they are living up to those promises, said India currently is doing its “fair share,” based on historic responsibility for the problem and its currently capabilities.

But its current efforts, the group says, are “not con-sistent with the Paris Agreement, and domestic emissions need to peak and start reducing, including with international support.” It

added that while the pan-demic has provided India with a chance to “accelerate a transition away from coal to renewable energy,” there are “no clear signs that India is seizing that opportunity.” “While no new coal power stations have been built in 2020, the government is encouraging more coal mining and increased coal production which is not con-sistent with a green recovery,” the group wrote in an analysis, saying India must develop a strategy to phase out coal for power generation before 2040.

Kerry this week met with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and praised his determination to move India in the right direction. “He’s deeply invested in this,” both as an expression of spir-itual and personal values, Kerry said in the interview.

A right-leaning Hindu nationalist leader, Modi has publicly embraced the fight against climate change. The push also aligns with other objectives of his government such as promoting energy independence and reducing air pollution.

At the same time, Modi has a “tough hand to play,” Kerry acknowledged. He must gen-erate jobs for a growing popu-lation and modernize India’s infrastructure, all with limited resources. The developed world needs “to help with that.” Kerry’s trip is part of an attempt “to get all the major emitters on board to do more,” said Ajay Mathur, a former Indian climate negotiator and the director-general of the International Solar Alliance.

TOM RANDALL BLOOMBERG

Enough vaccines have now been administered to fully vaccinate about 5 percent of the global population - but the distribution has been lopsided. Most vaccines are going to the wealthiest countries.

As of Thursday, 40 percent of the COVID-19 vac-cines administered glo-bally have gone to people in 27 wealthy nations that rep-resent 11 percent of the global population. Countries making up the least-wealthy 11 percent have gotten just 1.6 percent of COVID-19 vaccines administered so far, according to an analysis of data col-lected by the Bloomberg Vaccine Tracker.

In other words, countries with the highest incomes are vaccinating 25 times faster than those with the lowest.

Bloomberg’s database of COVID-19 vaccinations has tracked more than 726 million doses administered in 154 coun-tries. As part of our effort to assess vaccine access around the world, the tracker has a new interactive tool measuring countries by wealth, popu-lation and access to vaccines.

The US, for example, has 24 percent of the world’s vac-cinations but just 4.3 percent of the population, while Pakistan has 0.1 percent of the vaccine coverage for 2.7 percent of the global popu-lation. The pattern is repeated across the globe and follows efforts by wealthy countries to pre-purchase billions of doses of vaccines, enough to cover their populations several times over, according to a separate analysis of vaccine deals.

The US is on track to cover 75 percent of its resi-dents in the next three months.

Meanwhile, nearly half of countries still haven’t reached 1 percent of their populations. The disparity calculations don’t include more than 40 countries, mostly among the world’s poorest, that don’t yet have public vaccination data. Those uncharted coun-tries represent almost 8 percent of the global population.

In the US, the federal gov-ernment determines where vaccines are sent. So far, each state has been allocated vac-cines based on its population size. While there are differ-ences in access from neigh-borhood to neighborhood, each state has a fair share roughly proportional to its number of residents.

There’s no mechanism to ensure equitable distribution worldwide. If all of the world’s vaccines were dis-tributed based on population,

the US would have adminis-tered nearly six times its fair share. The UK would have used up 7 times its popu-lation-weighted allotment (outpacing the EU’s double-share). Topping the list are the UAE and Israel, with nine and 12 times their population-based share, respectively.

China has vaccinated its people at a rate that’s roughly in line with the global average - administering 20 percent of the world’s vacci-nations for 18 percent of the global population. It has also exported vaccines to less wealthy countries, sometimes at no cost.

The world’s least wealthy continent, Africa, is also the least vaccinated. Of its 54 countries, only three have have inoculated more than 1 percent of their populations. More than 20 countries aren’t even on the board yet.

John Kerry urges bold action on climate to avoid global ‘suicide pact’

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09SATURDAY 10 APRIL 2021 EUROPE

Prince Philip, husband of Queen Elizabeth, dies at 99REUTERS — LONDON

Prince Philip, Queen Elizabeth’s husband who helped modernise the monarchy and steer the British royal family through repeated crises during seven decades of service, died yesterday at Windsor Castle. He was 99.

The Duke of Edinburgh, as he was officially known, had been by his wife’s side throughout her 69-year reign, the longest in British history. During that time he earned a reputation for a tough, no-nonsense attitude and a propensity for occasional gaffes.

“It is with deep sorrow that Her Majesty The Queen announces the death of her beloved husband, His Royal Highness The Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh,” the palace said in a statement.

“His Royal Highness passed away peacefully this morning at Windsor Castle. Further announcements will be made in due course. The Royal Family join with people around the world in mourning his loss.”

Flags at Buckingham Palace and at government buildings across Britain were lowered to half-mast and within an hour of the announcement the public began to lay flowers outside Windsor Castle and Buckingham Palace.

The royal family’s website was also shut down, replaced by a photo of Philip and the announcement of his death.

A Greek prince, Philip married Eliz-abeth in 1947. He went on to play a key role helping the monarchy to adapt to a changing world in the post-World War Two period, and behind the walls of Buckingham Palace was the one key figure the queen could trust and turn

to, knowing he could tell her exactly what he thought.

“He has, quite simply, been my strength and stay all these years,” Eliz-abeth, 94, said in a rare personal tribute to Philip in a speech marking their 50th wedding anniversary in 1997.

“I, and his whole family, and this and many other countries, owe him a debt greater than he would ever claim, or we shall ever know.”

The College of Arms, Britain’s heraldic authority, said there would be no state funeral or lying-in-state, reflecting Philip’s well-known aversion to making a fuss and COVID-19 restric-tions in England.

“His Royal Highness’s body will lie at rest in Windsor Castle ahead of the funeral in St George’s Chapel. This is in line with custom and with His Royal Highness’s wishes,” it said in a statement.

“It is regretfully requested that members of the public do not attempt to attend or participate in any of the events that make up the funeral.”

Philip spent four weeks in hospital earlier this year for treatment for an infection and to have a heart pro-cedure, but returned to Windsor in early March. He died two months before his 100th birthday.

The prince’s charm and disincli-nation to tolerate those he regarded as foolish or sycophantic earned him respect from some Britons. But to others, his sometimes brusque demeanour made him appear rude and aloof. He was a delight to newspaper editors keen to pick up on any stray remark at official events.

The former naval officer, who served in the Royal Navy during the war and was mentioned in dispatches for bravery, admitted he found it hard to give up the military career he loved

and to take on the job as the monarch’s consort, for which there was no clear-cut provision.

In private, the prince was regarded as the head of his family, but protocol obliged the man dubbed “the second handshake” to spend his public life lit-erally one step behind his wife.

“There was no precedent. If I asked somebody ‘what do you expect me to do?’, they all looked blank — they had no idea, nobody had much idea,” he said in an interview to mark his 90th birthday.

After completing more than 22,000 solo appearances, Philip retired from public life in August 2017, although after that he occasionally appeared at official engagements.

His last appearance was in July at a military ceremony at Windsor Castle, the royal palace west of London where he and the monarch have resided during COVID-19 lockdowns.

“On the occasions when I met him, I was always struck by his obvious joy at life, his enquiring mind and his ability to communicate to people from every background and walk of life,” Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby said.

Philippos Schleswig-Holstein Son-derburg-Glucksburg was born on a dining room table on the Greek island of Corfu on June 10, 1921, the fifth child and only son of Prince Andrew of Greece.

He married the queen, then Princess Elizabeth, at Westminster Abbey on November 20, 1947, five years before she came to the throne in 1952. The couple, who were third cousins, had four children, Prince Charles, the heir to the throne, Princess Anne, and Princes Andrew and Edward.

The death of the queen’s husband and closest confidant will raise ques-tions over whether she might consider abdication, but royal commentators see little or no chance of this.

“The main lesson that we have learned is that tolerance is the one essential ingredient of any happy mar-riage,” Philip said in a speech in 1997.

“It may not be quite so important when things are going well, but it is absolutely vital when things get dif-ficult. You can take it from me that the queen has the quality of tolerance in abundance.”

UK mourns Prince Philip; leaders honour his service to queen

The College of Arms, Britain’s heraldic authority, said there would be no state funeral or lying-in-state, reflecting Philip’s well-known aversion to making a fuss and COVID-19 restrictions in England.

A screen with a picture and a message about Britain’s Prince Philip is seen at Piccadilly Circus after he died at the age of 99, in London, yesterday.

AP — LONDON

World leaders and people on the street honoured Prince Philip’s life of service to his wife, Queen Elizabeth II, and the British nation yesterday after hearing of the death of a man who had been at the center of public life longer than most of them have been alive.

At Buckingham Palace, the queen’s London residence, members of the public laid daf-fodils at the gates, and the flag was lowered to half-staff. The BBC interrupted programming to broadcast the national anthem, “God Save the Queen.”

Prime Minister Boris Johnson said Philip, 99, “earned the affection of gen-erations here in Britain, across the Commonwealth and around the world.”

“We are a kingdom united both in grief and in gratitude,” Johnson said. “Grief at Prince Philip’s passing, and gratitude for his decades of selfless service to the country.”

Philip, who served in the Royal Navy during World War

II, married the future queen in 1947 and kept up a full schedule of public appearances until he retired in 2017.

US President Joe Biden offered condolences to the queen “on behalf of the people of the United States.”

“The impact of his decades of devoted public service is

evident in the worthy causes he lifted up as patron, in the environmental efforts he championed, in the members of the Armed Forces that he supported, in the young people he inspired, and so much more,” he said. “His legacy will live on not only through his family, but in all the charitable

endeavors he shaped.”S o o n a f t e r t h e

announcement of Philip’s death, people lined up outside Buckingham Palace to see the official notice that had been attached to the gate. It was removed soon afterward because of concerns that it would attract crowds, vio-lating social distancing rules during the COVID-19 pandemic.

“I’m quite emotional actually even just talking about it,” Louisa Crook, a 41-year-old London resident, said outside Buckingham Palace.

“The news broke as we were walking through Par-liament Square, and my daughter and I just said we just felt like we had to come down here and just be near the palace — safely, obviously, masks and everything else — and just be close to the Royal Family today.”

Around the country, others marked Philip’s death in their own way.

The tenor bell at West-minster Abbey is being tolled

99 times to mark each year of the Duke of Edinburgh’s life.

A two-minute’s silence was held at cricket matches in Eng-land’s county championship and at the Grand National horse racing meeting.

The government said official flags will fly at half-staff throughout the UK until after the Philip’s funeral.

Justin Welby, the arch-bishop of Canterbury, the most senior cleric in the Anglican Church, gave thanks to God for Philip’s life of dedicated service.

“As we recover and rebuild after the terrible trial of the coronavirus pandemic, we will need fortitude and a deep sense of commitment to serving others,” Welby wrote. “Throughout his life Prince Philip displayed those qualities in abundance, and I pray that we can take inspiration from his example.”

The royal families of Denmark, Monaco, the Neth-erlands, Qatar and the UAE sent messages to the queen. World leaders including

Australia’s Scott Morrison, I s r a e l ’ s B e n j a m i n Netanyahu, India’s Narendra Modi and Canada’s Justin Trudeau also expressed their sadness.

Even Russian President Vladimir Putin, who has been at odds with Britain over issues ranging from election inter-ference to the poisoning of a former spy in England, sent a telegram of condolence to the queen. The Russian Embassy in London noted that Philip was the great-great-grandson of Czar Nicholas I.

Philip “rightfully enjoyed respect among the British and international authorities,” Putin said.

The prince’s fictional family also reached out to the queen. The team behind Netf-lix’s hugely popular royal drama The Crown said they were “deeply saddened” to hear of his death.

Robert Lacey, a royal biog-rapher and adviser to The Crown, told the BBC that Philip was the “secret ingredient” of the queen’s success.

Former Portugal PM to stand trial for laundering, forgeryAP — LISBON

A Lisbon judge ruled yesterday to put former Portuguese Prime Minister José Sócrates on trial for alleged money-laundering and forgery but said the statute of limitations had expired on more than a dozen corruption allegations.

Judge Ivo Rosa said that $2m, much of it in cash, given to Sócrates by a childhood friend who was working for a Portuguese construction company amounted to an attempt to gain influence over the prime minister and win contracts.

Sócrates argued that the money and other assets, such as works of art and the use of an upscale Paris apartment, were loans from his longtime friend.

The forgery charges relate to documentation linked to the payments.

The fact that many pay-ments were in cash and the two men’s use of code words in phone conversations when dis-cussing money suggested corrupt acts, but the statute of limitations to prosecute Sócrates on corruption charges has run out, the judge said.

The judge dismissed other allegations of corruption

against Sócrates either because of a lack of evidence or the statute of limitations.

Both prosecutors and Sócrates can appeal yesterday’s ruling.

Prosecutors alleged that Sócrates pocketed around $40m during and after his six years in office between 2005 and 2011.

Sócrates, 63, who was a centre-left Socialist prime min-ister, has denied any wrongdoing.

He was suspected of being at the center of a web of shady corporate interests that paid for his influence to win contracts and gain business advantages in the construction, banking and telecommunications sectors. The charges reportedly run to some 5,000 pages.

The case has gripped Por-tugal since Sócrates’ arrest at Lisbon Airport in 2014, and the judge took the rare step of allowing Friday’s proceedings to be broadcast live.

Translating tens of thou-sands of pages of documents from French and English con-tributed to delaying the case, but the Portuguese legal system is notoriously slow and the subject of frequent criticism. Prosecutors complain about a lack of resources.

EU seeks new deal for 1.8 billion Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine dosesREUTERS — BRUSSELS

The European Commission is seeking EU governments’ approval to launch talks with Pfizer and BioNTech for the purchase of up to 1.8 billion doses of their COVID-19 vaccines to be delivered in 2022 and 2023, an EU official told Reuters.

Earlier yesterday, German daily Die Welt reported that the Commission was shortly to sign contracts to buy up to 1.8 billion doses, but did not say with which company.

The EU official, who asked not to be named because the matter is confidential, said the EU executive had already decided to approach

Pfizer-BioNTech and that EU governments backed the plan, though there was not yet a definitive approval.

A Commission spokesman confirmed plans to buy the additional doses, of which half would be optional.

He also confirmed that the EU executive had already iden-tified one supplier, a manufac-turer of mRNA vaccines, but declined to comment on which company would be approached to negotiate the contract.

“If provided the opportunity Pfizer and BioNTech are pre-pared to supply Europe with hundreds of millions of doses of COVID vaccines in 2022 and 2023 produced in our manu-facturing facilities in Europe,”

a Pfizer spokesman said.The two companies have

the capacity to produce more than 3 billion doses of vaccine in 2022, he added.

Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna are already supplying the EU with mRNA vaccines and

German biotech firm CureVac is seeking EU approval for its mRNA shot.

The vaccines would be delivered under monthly time-tables and with clauses obliging the supplier to deliver, the EU official said.

Spanish police arrest five in probe into migrant boat deathsAP — BARCELONA

Spanish police said they have detained five men for allegedly navigating two migrant boats to the Canary Islands and being responsible for the deaths of some of its passengers.

The men are being investi-gated for “favouring illegal immigration” with three of them also being investigated for

homicide, Spain’s national police said in a statement yes-terday. A judge ordered four of them to be held in custody.

The arrests come after an investigation was launched into two boats that arrived in the islands of Gran Canaria and Lanzarote on March 16 and April 2 respectively.

In the first boat, 62 migrants and asylum seekers had

departed the coast of Dakhla, in Morocco-controlled Western Sahara, and spent five days with little food or water trying to reach the Canaries. When Spanish rescuers found them, only 53 people remained onboard, including 10 minors. None had life vests and many suffered from severe hypo-t h e r m i a r e q u i r i n g hospitalisation.

Among them was a 2-year-old girl from Mali who died a few days later. Her dramatic rescue and subsequent death grabbed the national headlines in Spain. Survivors later reported that nine people had perished during the Atlantic crossing, including a toddler. Their bodies were thrown into the ocean according to sur-vivors interrogated by police.

A healthcare worker taking syringes with Pfizer-BioNTech coronavirus vaccine out of a fridge in Berlin, yesterday.

Bouquets of flowers are seen outside Buckingham Palace after Britain's Prince Philip, husband of Queen Elizabeth, died at the age of 99, in London, yesterday.

10 SATURDAY 10 APRIL 2021EUROPE

Kremlin says it fears full-scale fighting in eastern UkraineAP — MOSCOW

The Kremlin said yesterday that it fears the resumption of full-scale fighting in eastern Ukraine and could take steps to protect civilians there, a stark warning that comes amid a Russian troop buildup along the border.

The statement by Russian President Vladimir Putin’s spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, reflected the Kremlin’s deter-mination to prevent Ukraine from using force to try to reclaim control over separatist-controlled territory in the country’s east.

Ukrainian forces and Russia-backed separatists have been fighting in eastern Ukraine since shortly after Moscow’s 2014 annexation of Ukraine’s Crimea Peninsula. More than 14,000 people have died in the conflict, and efforts to negotiate a political set-tlement have stalled.

Ukraine and the West have accused Russia of sending in troops and weapons to help separatists, accusa-tions that Moscow has denied. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zel-enskiy visited his country’s soldiers in the Donbas region on Thursday.

Western and Ukrainian officials have raised concerns in recent weeks about increasingly frequent ceasefire violations in the country’s industrial heartland, known as Donbas. They also expressed worries about the Russian

troop buildup along the border with Ukraine.

During a call with Putin on Thursday, German Chancellor Angela Merkel “called for the removal of these troop reinforcements in order to achieve a de-escalation of the situation.”

White House press secretary Jen Psaki said Thursday that the US is also increasingly worried about the troop buildup, noting that Russia now has more troops on the border with Ukraine than at any time since 2014.

In response to those statements, Peskov said Russia is free to deploy its troops wherever it wants on its ter-ritory. He accused the Ukrainian mil-itary of an “escalation of provocative actions” along the line of control in the east that threatens Russia’s security.

“The Kremlin has fears that a civil war could resume in Ukraine, and if a

civil war, a full-scale military action resumes near our borders that would threaten the Russian Federation’s security,” Peskov said. “The ongoing escalation of tensions is quite unprecedented.”

Dmitry Kozak, a Putin aide who serves as Russia’s top negotiator with Kiev, warned Ukraine on Thursday against using force to retake control of the east, where many residents have Russian citizenship. Such a move would mark “the beginning of an end for Ukraine,” he said.

Kozak said Russia would likely act to protect civilians if they faced a potential massacre like the one that took place during the Bosnian War in Srebrenica in 1995.

Asked about Kozak’s comment, Peskov said that in the case of a Sre-brenica-like threat, “all countries, including Russia, will take steps to prevent such tragedies.” He alleged that that virulent nationalist rhetoric in Ukraine was inflaming hatred against the mostly Russian-speaking popu-lation of the east.

A Turkish Foreign Ministry official said yesterday that the United States has notified Turkey that two US war-ships will sail to the Black Sea on April 14 and April 15 and stay there until May 4 and May 5, respectively.

The official, speaking on condition of anonymity in line with government

rules said that the United States notified Turkey 15 days prior to the ships’ passage in line with a convention reg-ulating shipping through the Turkish straits.

Such visits by the US and other Nato ships have vexed Moscow, which long has bristled at Ukraine’s efforts to build up defense ties with the West and

its aspirations to eventually join Nato.Russian Foreign Ministry spokes-

woman Maria Zakharova warned yes-terday that Ukraine’s Nato bid “wouldn’t only lead to a massive esca-lation of the situation in the southeast but could also entail irreversible con-sequences for the Ukrainian statehood.”

Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskiy presents an award to a servicewoman as he visits positions of armed forces near the frontline with Russian-backed separatists in Donbass region, Ukraine, yesterday.

France advises vaccine mixing for some, amid clotting fearsAP — PARIS

French health officials said yesterday that people under 55 who received a first dose of the AstraZeneca vaccine should get other vaccines for their second shot because of an extremely rare risk of a blood clotting disorder.

Germany is expected to rec-ommend a similar booster dose strategy for people under age 60. The World Health Organi-zation says it’s too early to know whether to recommend such vaccine mixing, however, and the European Medicines Agency hasn’t advised putting any age restrictions on the use of the AstraZeneca vaccine.

French authorities said the British-Swedish pharmaceutical company’s vaccine remains

central to its vaccination plan strategy, and they urged older populations to keep taking it as France’s hospitals battle another surge in COVID-19 patients.

“It’s an effective vaccine,” Dominique Le Guludec, pres-ident of France’s High Authority for Health, told reporters. “If we want to win the battle against the virus, we must use all weapons at our disposition.”

Several European countries decided in recent weeks to limit their use of the AstraZeneca vaccine to older people because of strengthening evidence the vaccine may be linked to rare blood clots in younger populations.

Since March 19, France has only offered the vaccine to people over 55. More than half

a million French people under that age received a first dose before then.

France’s High Authority for Health said yesterday that it is maintaining the age limit for now and recommending that younger people who received the AstraZeneca vaccine for their first dose should get booster shots of the Pfizer or Moderna vaccines instead.

“It’s a precautionary measure,” Veran said yesterday on RTL radio.

The health authority also called for more research on the effects of vaccine mixing.

Germany on March 30 rec-ommended restricting the use of the AstraZeneca vaccine to people over 60, in most cases. The country’s independent vaccine expert panel last week

recommended giving a second shot of the BioNTech or Moderna vaccines to people under 60 who had received a first shot of AstraZeneca’s product.

Health ministers from Ger-many’s 16 states are expected to sign off on the recommen-dation next week.

Dr. Margaret Harris, a WHO spokeswoman, said Friday that an advisory group on immuni-zation made recommendations about the AstraZeneca vaccine in February, but didn’t have enough information at the time to determine whether it could be used in conjunction with other vaccines.

“There is not adequate data to be able to say whether this is something that could be done,” Harris told a UN press briefing

in Geneva.France, which has reported

one of the world’s highest virus death tolls, has closed schools and nonessential businesses for a month and imposed nationwide travel restrictions to stem the spread of new virus variants.

It’s also trying to speed up vaccinations. President Emmanuel Macron acknowl-edged yesterday that the United States “won the bet” on coro-navirus vaccines by investing massively and moving fast with experimental treatments.

Macron visited a French factory that started bottling and packaging Pfizer-BioNTech vaccines this week, and urged his compatriots to join a “national war effort” to admin-ister and make vaccines.

Czech opens largest vaccination centre but waiting for shotsREUTERS — PRAGUE

The largest COVID-19 vacci-nation centre in the Czech Republic was put through its paces yesterday, but it will not be fully operational until May as the country badly hit by the pandemic waits for more vaccine shots.

The government has come under criticism for its handling of the coronavirus pandemic, including its failure to order as many vaccines as it could under the EU’s programme.

Following a spat in Brussels over distribution of extra vac-cines among member states, the Czechs are now projected to lag behind all other EU countries by mid-year.

The country of 10.7 million has the world’s highest per-capita death toll from COVID-19, according to Our World in Data, while virus infection rates have only just started easing.

Deaths from the disease have hit 27,617, more than dou-bling in 2021 alone. On Thursday, 5,245 new cases were reported, the lowest weekday tally since mid-December. In total, 1.57 million infections have been reported since March 2020.

The vaccination centre at Prague’s O2 Arena complex is to be a key component in ramping up inoculations. But it faces a three-week delay until May 3 before starting with a capacity of 7,000 people a day.

Yesterday, 1,000 state emergency personnel were set to get shots.

“The centre will start in full at the beginning of May, because at the moment there are not enough vaccines for it to go at full capacity,” Prime Minister Andrej Babis said during an inspection yesterday.

The country has administered 1.97 million vaccine doses so far, including

663,006 people who have got both shots. On Thursday, 58,928

shots were given, the highest daily total.

Flights in Albania resume after 2-day airport closure

AP — TIRANA

Commercial flights resumed at Albania’s Tirana Interna-tional Airport yesterday after they were blocked for two days by an air traffic controllers’ strike.

The first commercial flight with passengers left the airport for Italy yesterday at 9:05am local time. Only “essential” flights took place the previous day. Those included a plane bringing a batch of virus vaccines.

The government has hired Turkish and Greek controllers to replace the local ones. The controllers, who are seeking a pay rise, have avoided calling their action a strike, as that is not allowed under Albanian law, instead declaring a tem-porary inability to work due to stress.

Prime Minister Edi Rama said two groups of controllers from Turkey and Greece would “work together to con-tinue the operation.” Many Albanian controllers have agreed to resume work, he added.

The government con-sidered the controllers’ walkout illegal.

Three controllers have been detained and are being probed on suspicion of abuse of post. Twenty-seven others were also questioned.

The controllers’ union says their pay has been cut by 62 percent over the past year due to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Over the same period, Albania’s air traffic has fallen by 57 percent, according Infra-structure Minister Belinda Balluku.

The incident has also turned into a political issue as there is a parliamentary election in the country on April 25.

Russian President spokesman, Dmitry Peskov accused the Ukrainian military of an “escalation of provocative actions” along the line of control in the east that threatens Russia’s security.

A firefighter receives a dose of the coronavirus vaccine during a trial run of the national vaccination centre in Prague, Czech Republic, yesterday.

Blinken urges Kosovo to resume talks with SerbiaAP — PRISTINA

Antony Blinken (pictured), the US Secretary of State, has told Kosovo that the normalisation of talks with Serbia is essential in its path toward the European Union.

Kosovar Prime Minister Albin Kurti on Thursday made public a letter of congratula-tions he had received from Blinken a day earlier.

Blinken urged Kosovo “to engage productively and without delay in the US-sup-ported EU-facilitated dialogue with Serbia.”

“Securing a comprehensive normalisation agreement with

Serbia centered on mutual rec-ognition is essential to Kosovo’s ability to reach its full potential and move forward on its EU

accession path,” wrote Blinken.Brussels also has stressed

that Kosovo-Serbia normali-zation talks are fundamental in their goal of becoming bloc members one day.

Kurti, who took the post on March 22 after his left-wing Self-Determination Movement, or Vetevendosje!, won the most votes in Kosovo’s February 14 parliamentary election, has said that talks with Serbia are not high among its immediate goals.

Negotiations to normalise ties between Kosovo and neigh-boring Serbia, which started a decade ago, stalled last year.

Kurti and new President

Vjosa Osmani have mentioned the issue of the some 1,640 people missing in the 1998-1999 war as a priority in those talks.

Kosovo declared inde-pendence from Serbia in 2008, a decade after a brutal 1998-1999 war between separatist ethnic Albanian rebels and Serb forces, which ended after a 78-day Nato air campaign that drove Serb troops out and a peacekeeping force moved in.

Most Western nations have recognized Kosovo’s sover-eignty, but Serbia and its allies Russia and China don’t. Ten-sions over Kosovo remain a source of volatility in the Balkans.

Greek journalist shot dead outside his Athens homeREUTERS — ATHENS

Two gunmen on a motorbike shot and killed a prominent Greek crime journalist near his home in Athens yesterday, police said.

George Karaivaz, a veteran journalist for private broad-caster STAR TV, was well-known to Greek audiences for his coverage of law and order and police stories.

Government spokeswoman Aristotelia Peloni said the murder “shocked us all”.

“Authorities are already investigating in order to arrest

the perpetrators and bring them to justice,” she said.

Police said Karaivaz was shot early yesterday afternoon by two individuals on a motorbike who fired multiple rounds near his home in Alimos, in the south of Athens. Twelve bullet casings were col-lected from the scene, a police official said.

There were no immediate reports of a possible motive for yesterday’s shooting, however police said the murder was clearly carefully planned.

“It was a professional hit,” said the police official.

11SATURDAY 10 APRIL 2021 AMERICAS

North Carolina sites to resume J&J vaccines after CDC reviewAP — RALEIGH, NORTH CAROLINA

Federal health officials said it’s safe to continue administering Johnson & Johnson shots at three vaccination sites in North Carolina that had an increase in reports of adverse reactions on Thursday.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention gave the all-clear late Thursday and again yesterday morning. Four of the more than 2,300 people who received a J&J vaccine at PNC Arena in Raleigh on Thursday were hospitalised, and all but one had been released by night. Fourteen people experienced minor

reactions that could be treated on-site.

Saying they want the more than 2,000 people who have appointments to know which vaccine they’re going to receive, Wake County public health offi-cials said they would administer Pfizer doses at PNC Arena and allow those who prefer a single-dose J&J shot to reschedule their appointment.

The CDC performed vaccine lot analyses in North Carolina and did not find reasons for concern.

“Reactions are expected, but what’s important is that our patients are here with us being monitored, and medical

personnel are right here in our clinics to respond to these rare events,” Kim McDonald, Wake County’s medical director, said in a statement.

Two UNC Health clinics plan to resume appointments for the J&J vaccine today after the CDC informed them that it “found no evidence of a safety concern for the Johnson & Johnson vaccine” after looking at cases in North Carolina and other states.

David Wohl, who oversees vaccine operations at the Friday Center in Chapel Hill and Hillsborough Hospital, said between eight and 14 of roughly 1,250 J&J vaccine recipients it

served on Thursday fainted after receiving the shot, though nobody was taken to a hospital.

The medical system said in a statement that those who get the J&J vaccine tend to be younger and have an aversion to needles, which is why they prefer the single-dose shot over the two-dose Pfizer and Moderna vaccines.

“This may also be why there have been more reactions in those vaccinated with J&J,” wrote UNC Health spokesman Alan Wolf.

Wolf said the Hillsborough clinic would offer the Moderna vaccine to patients scheduled

to receive the Johnson & Johnson shot yesterday.

He said the clinic is exploring ways for the Hillsborough and Chapel Hill locations to better identify people with a history of fainting around needles and provide additional support by having them lie facing upward, offering them drinks and snacks and not moving them to a separate observation area.

“We believe that the J&J vaccine is safe,” Wolf said. “Very few people (less than 1 percent) who have received this vaccine at our clinics have reported lightheadedness or fainting.”

Evacuation after volcano erupts in CaribbeanREUTERS — ROSE HALL, ST VINCENT AND THE GRENADINES

L a Soufriere volcano on the eastern Caribbean island of St. Vincent erupted yesterday after decades of inactivity, sending dark plumes of ash and smoke billowing into the sky and forcing thousands from surrounding villages to evacuate.

Dormant since 1979, the volcano started showing signs of activity in December, spewing steam and smoke and rumbling away. That picked up this week, prompting Prime Minister of St. Vincent and the Grenadines Ralph Gonsalves to order an evacuation of the sur-rounding area late on Thursday.

Early yesterday it finally erupted. Ash and smoke plunged the neighboring area into near total darkness, blotting out the bright morning sun, said a witness, who reported hearing the explosion from Rose Hall, a nearby village.

St. Vincent and the Gren-adines, which has a population of just over 100,000, has not experienced volcanic activity since 1979. An eruption by La Soufriere in 1902 killed more than 1,000 people. The name means “sulfur outlet” in French.

The eruption column was estimated to reach 10km high, the University of the West Indies Seismic Research Centre said, warning other explosive eruptions could occur. Ash fall could affect the Grenadines, Barbados, St. Lucia and Grenada.

“The ash plume may cause flight delays due to diversions,” the centre said on Twitter. “On the ground, ash can cause

discomfort in persons suffering with respiratory illnesses and will impact water resources.”

Some 4,500 residents near the volcano had evacuated already via ships and by road, Gonsalves said in a news con-ference yesterday.

Heavy ash fall had halted the evacuation efforts somewhat due to poor visibility, according to St. Vincent’s N a t i o n a l E m e r g e n c y

Management Organisation (NEMO).

“The place in general is in a frenzy,” said Lavern King, 28, a shelter volunteer. “People are still being evacuated from the red zone, it started yesterday evening and into last night.”

Gonsalves said that depending on the extent of the damage, it could be four months before evacuees could return home.

A National Emergency Management Organisation of St. Vincent and the Grenadines official ensures all evacuees are safe before giving approval to the driver to depart following the eruption of La Soufriere volcano on the eastern Caribbean island of St. Vincent, yesterday.

Biden forms commission to study US top court reformAP — WASHINGTON

President Joe Biden yesterday ordered a study of adding seats to the Supreme Court, creating a bipartisan commission that will spend the next six months examining the politically incen-diary issues of expanding the court and instituting term limits for its justices.

In launching the review, Biden fulfilled a campaign promise made amid pressure from activists and Democrats to realign the Supreme Court after its composition tilted sharply to the right during Pres-ident Donald Trump’s term. Trump added three justices to the high court, including con-servative Justice Amy Coney Barrett, who was confirmed to replace liberal Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg just days before

last year’s presidential election.During the campaign, Biden

repeatedly sidestepped ques-tions on expanding the court. A former chair of the Senate Judi-ciary Committee, Biden has asserted that the system of judicial nominations is “getting out of whack,” but has not said if he supports adding seats or making other changes to the

current system of lifetime appointments, such as imposing term limits.

The 36-member com-mission, composed largely of academics, was instructed to spend 180 days studying the issues. But it was not charged with making a recommendation under the White House order that created it.

The panel will be led by Bob Bauer, who served as White House counsel for former Pres-ident Barack Obama, and Cristina Rodriguez, a Yale Law School professor who served in the Office of Legal Counsel for Obama.

The makeup of the Supreme Court, always a hot-button issue, ignited again in 2016 when Democrats declared that Republicans gained an unfair advantage by blocking Obama’s

nomination of Judge Merrick Garland to fill the seat left empty by the death of conserv-ative Justice Antonin Scalia. Then-Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, a Republican, refused to even hold hearings on filling the vacancy, even though it was more than six months until the next presi-dential election.

In the wake of McConnell’s power play, some progressives have viewed adding seats to the court or setting term limits as a way to offset the influence of any one president on its makeup. Conservatives, in turn, have denounced such ideas as “court-packing” similar to the failed effort by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1930s.

Earlier this week, liberal justice Stephen Breyer, the court’s oldest member, warned

liberal advocates of making big changes, including expanding the number of justices. Breyer said in a speech Tuesday that advocates should think “long and hard” about what they’re proposing. Politically driven change could diminish the trust Americans place in the court, Breyer said.

The size of the court has been set at nine members since just after the Civil War. Any effort to alter it would be explosive, particularly at a moment when Congress is nearly evenly divided. Changing the number of justices would require congressional approval.

“With five justices appointed by presidents who lost the popular vote, it’s crucial that we consider every option for wresting back political control of the Supreme Court,” said Nan

Aron, president of the Alliance for Justice, a liberal judicial advocacy group. “President Biden’s com-mission demonstrates a strong commitment to studying this sit-uation and taking action.”

Biden pledged to create the commission during an October television interview. Its launch comes amid speculation as to whether he will be able to put his own stamp on the court if Breyer retires at the end of the current term.

The 82-year-old Breyer is the oldest member of the court and the senior member of its three-justice liberal wing. A number of progressive groups have urged Breyer to retire while Democrats still control the Senate and the confirmation process.

Biden has promised to appoint the first Black woman to the court.

US considers funds to Central America to stem migrationREUTERS — WASHINGTON

The United States is considering a conditional cash transfer programme to help address economic woes that lead migrants from certain Central American countries to trek north, as well as sending COVID-19 vaccines to those countries, a senior White House official told Reuters yesterday.

The possible cash transfer programme would be targeted at people in the Northern Tri-angle region of Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador, Roberta Jacobson, the White House’s southern border coor-dinator, said in an interview, without saying who exactly would receive the cash.

Roughly 168,000 people were picked up by US Border Patrol agents at the US-Mexico border in March, the highest monthly tally since March 2001

and part of steadily increasing arrivals in recent months.

“We’re looking at all of the productive options to address both the economic reasons people may be migrating, as well as the protection and security reasons,” she said.

Jacobson did not provide a detailed explanation of how any cash transfer program would work.

“The one thing I can promise you is the US gov-ernment isn’t going to be handing out money or checks to people,” she said.

Jacobson said that no decision had been made regarding whether to prioritize sending vaccines to the Northern Triangle countries, but added that the Biden administration would consider how the vaccines could help ailing economies in those countries.

The 36-member commission was instructed to spend 180 days studying the issues. But it was not charged with making a recommendation under the White House order that created it.

Jill Biden visits classroomFirst Lady Jill Biden (right) arrives to a classroom at the James Rushton Early Learning Center in Birmingham, Alabama, yesterday.

George Floyd's medical examiner stands by homicide conclusionREUTERS — MINNEAPOLIS

The medical examiner who performed the autopsy on George Floyd after last May’s deadly arrest explained how he concluded the death was a homicide at the hands of police in testimony yesterday at former Minneapolis policeman Derek Chauvin’s murder trial.

As jurors studied autopsy photographs, Dr. Andrew Baker, Hennepin County’s chief medical examiner, said he stood by the cause of death he deter-mined last year: “cardiopul-monary arrest complicating law enforcement subdual, restraint and neck compression.”

In short, Baker ruled that Floyd’s heart stopped beating and his lungs stopped working because Chauvin, 45, and other officers pinned him to the ground in a way that starved his body of oxygen.

Prosecutors also have pre-sented testimony from four other medical experts to chal-lenge Chauvin’s defence against murder and manslaughter charges — that Floyd may have died of a drug overdose — and back up Baker’s findings. Chauvin has pleaded not guilty.

Chauvin, who is white, was seen in videos of the arrest kneeling for more than nine minutes on Floyd’s neck as the

46-year-old Black man, in handcuffs, begged for his life in a fading voice. Floyd’s death prompted protests against racism and police brutality in the US and around the world.

Baker described how he performed the autopsy, including extra steps to cut into the flesh around where Floyd’s wrists were handcuffed and along his back to look for bruising from the arrest. Chauvin and three other officers were attempting to arrest Floyd on suspicion of using a fake $20 bill to buy cig-arettes at a grocery store. They were fired the following day.

Baker said he noted Floyd’s heart disease and the fentanyl and methamphetamine found in his blood on the death cer-tificate because they may have played a role in the death, but “were not direct causes.”

Prosecutor Jerry Blackwell asked Baker why he did not photograph Floyd’s heart, anticipating questions by Chau-vin’s lawyer on whether heart disease caused Floyd’s death.

“I don’t normally photo-graph organs that appear to be perfectly normal unless there’s some reason to,” Baker said. “I don’t have a photograph of Mr. Floyd’s spleen or Mr. Floyd’s liver, either, because those were also grossly normal.”

Biden returns prisoner-of-war flag to perch atop White HouseAP — WASHINGTON

President Joe Biden has restored the prisoner-of-war/missing-in-action flag to its former location atop the White House.

The black-and-white POW/MIA flag returned atop the chief executive’s residence, just below the American flag, yesterday, which is National Former POW Recognition Day.

White House press sec-retary Jen Psaki said that the return was “in keeping with the president and first lady’s commitment to honor the sac-rifices of all those who serve.”

Last summer, former Pres-ident Donald Trump had moved the POW flag from its customary perch to a less prominent location on the White House South Lawn.

The location atop the White House can be seen from a much greater distance.

The move came after a request from a bipartisan group of senators. Senator Jon Tester tweeted that he was “proud” to see the flag above the White House again as a way of honoring “the sacrifices of our brave servicemembers who were held behind enemy lines, and those who have not yet returned home.”

The National League of Families POW/MIA flag, also known as the POW/MIA flag, consists of a silhouette of a prisoner of war before a guard tower and barbed wire in white on a black field. “POW/MIA”appears above the sil-houette and the words “You Are Not Forgotten” appear below in white of the black field.

12 SATURDAY 10 APRIL 2021AMERICAS

Top court orders probe on Bolsonaro’s pandemic stepsAP — SAO PAULO

A Brazilian Supreme Court justice ordered the Senate to investigate the government’s handling of the coronavirus crisis and the full court ruled that churches can be barred from reopening during the pandemic, threatening to further strain tensions between President Jair Bolsonaro and the judiciary.

The order by Justice Luis Roberto Barroso for a Senate probe came only minutes after the whole court upheld the power of local authorities to prevent churches and other houses of worship from opening.

Bolsonaro has downplayed the threat of the coronavirus while arguing that the economic and emotional impacts of shut-downs would harm more Bra-zilians than the pandemic.

He has at times bristled at the checks and balances from other branches of government, and has repeatedly criticized the Supreme Court for

upholding the power of gov-ernors and mayors to establish restrictions on economic and personal activity during the pandemic. Last year, he attended protests against the court.

The conservative president, a proud Christian who has the support of some of the coun-try’s main evangelical leaders, has opposed locally imposed lockdowns and other restric-tions that health experts have said were sorely needed to halt the virus’ spread.

In recent weeks, Brazil has become the epicenter of the pandemic crisis, accounting for more than one-quarter of the world’s deaths from COVID-19.

“The inquiry will call scien-tists from all over Brazil to testify and show how irrespon-sible the president’s statements were. It will get tougher for him. Public opinion will be heard at the Senate,” said Carlos Melo, a political science professor at Insper University in Sao Paulo.

“It was unavoidable. The time came for the political system to react.”

With the country’s death toll rising — among the 345,000 dead are three senators — more than the required 27 senators had already signed a request for a congressional investigation

into the administration’s han-dling of the pandemic, but moving forward required approval by the chamber’s pres-ident, Sen Rodrigo Pacheco.

Pacheco, who won his lead-ership post in January with Bol-sonaro’s support, had refrained from triggering the probe.

“It wasn’t the moment. That’s what I think,” Pacheco told reporters in Brasilia after the judge’s order. “This inquiry at this moment will be out of bounds. It might crown the national failure in this pandemic.”

Pacheco said a probe will inevitably drag forward the 2022 presidential race in which Bolsonaro is expected to seek reelection, giving opposition senators a platform for attacking the leader and poten-tially accusing him of com-mitting crimes.

The Senate is to look at how the government dealt with the COVID-19 crisis, and could level new criticism at Bolsonaro. If senators decided there was anything criminal in the

response, the Senate would have to ask the federal attorney general to open its own investigation.

The ruling on houses of worship doesn’t prevent local authorities from allowing churches to reopen, and some have already done so.

But the court acted after Justice Kassio Marques, the court’s only member appointed by Bolsonaro, allowed churches across Brazil to reopen today provided they followed health protocols. Many churches opened on Easter Sunday, some without observing social distancing.

Marques was overruled by his colleagues in a 9-2 vote that culminated Thursday.

Justice Gilmar Mendes said during his vote that Brazil has become “an international pariah in matters of health care.”

“Brazil, which was once a role model in public health, in immunization campaigns, is today in this highly embar-rassing situation,” he added.

Ecuador, Peru to elect leaders amid strengthened pandemicAP — LIMA

A surging coronavirus pandemic that has brought on new lockdown measures and exac-erbated fatigue in Ecuador and Peru has left many voters generally indifferent to the names they will see on the ballots Sunday, when the neigh-bouring South American nations are set to choose new presi-dents.

No candidate in each nation has garnered enough support to be a clear favourite, and after a year of collective suffering and corruption scandals, voters seem to be hoping for a winner who can pull them out of the pandemic’s economic mess with the least stumbles possible.

Ecuadoreans face a runoff between conservative busi-nessman Guillermo Lasso and Andrés Arauz, a disciple of former leftist President Rafael Correa. The winner will succeed President Lenin Moreno — a former Correa ally who turned

against him while in office and who is not seeking reelection.

Peruvians, meanwhile, face a tangled field of 18 candidates following years of political turmoil that have seen a series of presidents and even the whole congress itself ousted over corruption scandals. A runoff in June is virtually assured. All seats in congress, too, are being contested.

The country is among those hardest hit by COVID-19, with more than 1.5 million confirmed cases and over 53,400 deaths.

“There is no work, there are no opportunities in the coun-tryside, so we migrate to the city and many people are already in the city,” said Hernaldo Car-bajal, who came from Peru’s hinterlands to seek work in Lima, the country’s capital. “In my opinion, may the best man for peasants and provincials win.”

Amid the pandemic, Peru faced political chaos in November, when it cycled through three presidents in a

week after one was impeached by Congress over corruption allegations and protests forced his successor to resign.

Ecuador meanwhile saw an Indigenous uprising in October 2019 that paralysed the country for several days and forced the government to back down on a move to end fuel subsidies.

The pandemic paralysed 70 percent of businesses in Ecuador last year and brought the country’s unemployment rate to almost 68 percent. The country already had been in an economic slowdown that began in 2015, largely driven by the drop in oil prices. Similarly, in Peru, the world’s second largest copper producer, the economy spiraled downward when a lockdown of more than 100 days early in the pandemic left about 7 million unemployed.

Arauz advanced to Ecua-dor’s runoff with more than 30 percent of votes in the February 7 election. Officials several days later declared Lasso the second-place finisher after all votes

were tallied and about half of a percentage point separated him from environmentalist and Indigenous candidate Yaku Pérez.

Arauz is backed by Correa, a former ally of Cuba’s Fidel Castro and Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez and who remains

heavily influential despite a cor-ruption conviction that sent him fleeing to Belgium, beyond the reach of Ecuadoran prose-cutors. Arauz, 37, has proposed making the wealthy pay more taxes, backing away from agreements with the IMF and finding legal mechanisms to

force the repatriation of deposits that Ecuadorians have abroad.

A former banker, Lasso has lost the last two presidential contests. He favours free-market policies and Ecuador’s rapprochement with interna-tional organisations.

National Electoral Council members carrying electoral materials as part of a programme for people with disabilities to vote ahead of the second round in Ecuador’s presidential election, in Quito, yesterday.

Man mistakenly imprisoned for 44 years gets $750,000AP — DURHAM, NORTH CAROLINA

A man who served nearly 44 years in prison for a crime he says he didn’t commit has received compensation from the state of North Carolina.

Ronnie Long told The Char-lotte Observer that it’s not nearly enough.

Long received $750,000. It is by law the state’s top com-pensation for victims of wrongful incarceration.

Long’s attorney, Duke Uni-versity law professor Jamie Lau, said the amount is inade-quate for people who were imprisoned for decades. Long was convicted of raping the widow of a Cannon Mills exec-utive in 1976 by all-white jury in Concord. Potentially

exculpatory evidence was either intentionally withheld from his defense team or dis-appeared. And there was a tampered pool of potential jurors.

A federal court overturned Long’s conviction. He was released from prison in Sep-tember. And he was pardoned by Gov Roy Cooper.

“Fair? What’s fair?” Long told newspaper. “Ask yourself that question when these people took away your 20s, your 30s, your 40s, your 50s and they started in on your 60s.”

Long said his mother and father both asked if he was home in the last moments of their lives. He walked free six weeks after his mother’s death.

Brazil’s President Jair Bolsonaro attending a promotion ceremony for generals of the armed forces, at the Planalto Palace in Brasilia, on Thursday.

American rapper, actor DMX dead at 50REUTERS — NEW YORK

American rapper and actor Earl Simmons (pictured), known by the stage name DMX or Dark Man X, died yesterday, People magazine said, after suffering a heart attack during what media reports said was a drug overdose. He was 50 years old.

The chart-topping artist’s songs included “Party Up (Up in Here)” and “X Gon’ Give It To Ya.” His career had been marked by legal troubles and prison time.

“We are deeply saddened to announce today that our loved one, DMX, birth name of Earl Simmons, passed away at 50 years old at White Plains Hos-pital with his family by his side after being placed on life support for the past few days,” his family wrote in a statement quoted by the magazine.

DMX collapsed at home, his family had said, and was taken to a New York hospital where

his former manager said he had been placed on life support with no brain activity.

Celebrity publications TMZ and Billboard said he overdosed on drugs triggering a heart attack.

His debut album in 1998, “It’s Dark and Hell is Hot,” was the first of five in a row to top the Billboard 200 chart in the United States. He was the only rap artist with such a streak, according to a 2019 profile in GQ magazine.

He studied the Bible and prayed before and after every show, he told GQ. “Performing in front of people is beyond a high. It’s beyond a high that any drug could duplicate,” he said.

The rapper’s intense songs told stories of a complex charac-ter’s “sins of the streets,” according to a biography on all-music.com, which described DMX as a “hip-hop Johnny Cash.”

His album “…And Then There Was X” was his biggest seller, certified five-time

multiplatinum. DMX released eight albums and was nomi-nated for three Grammys.

DMX earned more than 40 film and television credits, including “Belly,” “Romeo Must Die,” and action films “Cradle 2 the Grave” and “Exit Wounds,” also contributing music to their soundtracks.

He had 15 children, according to media reports.

Before he died, his ex-wife Tashera Simmons, with whom he had four children, attended a vigil outside his hospital, where hundreds of fans danced to DMX songs. “The love is real,” she posted on Instagram.

Basketball star LeBron James had tweeted while DMX was in hospital: “To one of my fav artist growing up and still to this day DMX, my prayers are with you and sent to the almighty heaven’s above!”

In 2017, DMX pleaded guilty in federal court to avoiding paying $1.7m in taxes from

2000 to 2005 by shifting money among accounts belonging to managers and associates. He was sentenced to one year in prison.

The rap star’s prior arrest record included charges of animal cruelty, reckless driving, drug possession, weapons charges and probation viola-tions. He served prison time in Arizona and New York.

In the 1998 song “Slippin’,” DMX rapped: “To live is to suffer, But to survive, well, that’s to find meaning in the suffering.”

Kentucky governor signs bill limiting no knock-warrantsAP — LOUISVILLE

Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear signed a partial ban on no-knock warrants yesterday after months of demonstrations set off by the fatal shooting of Breonna Taylor in her home during a botched police raid.

Taylor, a 26-year-old Lou-isville emergency medical tech-nician studying to become a nurse, was shot multiple times in March 2020 after being roused from sleep by police. No drugs were found, and the warrant was later found to be flawed.

The law signed by the

Democratic governor is not the total statewide ban many dem-onstrators and some Demo-cratic lawmakers had sought, but it drew bipartisan support in the Republican-controlled legislature. It only permits no-knock warrants if there is “clear and convincing evidence” that the crime being investigated “would qualify a person, if con-victed, as a violent offender.”

The warrants must be exe-cuted between 6 am and 10 pm and officers are required to take additional steps to obtain war-rants. Judges are also required to sign legibly when approving them and an EMT must now be

nearby during execution of the warrant.

In the Taylor case, a no-knock warrant was approved as part of a narcotics investi-gation. Nonetheless, police said they did knock and announce their presence before entering Taylor’s apartment, though some witnesses have disputed that claim.

In September, a grand jury indicted one of the officers on wanton endangerment charges for shooting into a neighbor’s apartment, but none was charged in connection with Taylor’s death. That was based in part on the presentation of

Republican Attorney General Daniel Cameron, who recom-mended no charges against the officers who shot into Taylor’s apartment.

One of those officers, Myles Cosgrove, was fired, as was officer Joshua Jaynes, who had secured the warrant. Federal ballistics experts said they believe the shot that killed Taylor came from Cosgrove.

The legislation does not interfere with Louisville’s local ban on all no-knock warrants. Virginia passed a ban on all no-knock warrants last year. The warrants are also not permitted in Oregon and Florida.

“This inquiry at this moment will be out of bounds. It might crown the national failure in this pandemic,” said Sen Rodrigo Pacheco

Mexico detains cartel leader, local politician in two raidsAP — MEXICO CITY

Mexican prosecutors say they have detained one of the leaders of the Gulf Cartel, and in a related raid at a different house found a local politician with three guns.

The federal Attorney Gen-eral’s Office said that the raids took place earlier this week in the town of Salinas Victoria, just outside of Monterrey in the northern border state of Nuevo Leon.

Agents detained Evaristo Cruz, alias “El Vaquero” (The Cowboy), at one house with two other men, guns, cash and radios, prosecutors said. Cruz is reputedly a leader of the

“Cyclones” faction of the splin-tered Gulf Cartel, based in the neighbouring state of Tamaulipas.

Working on the same search warrant, agents detained local politician Raúl Cantú at another home, where three guns and possible mari-juana were allegedly found. Cantú is running for mayor of the town on the ticket of small Citizen’s Movement Party.

The party said in a statement that the guns at Cantú’s house were apparently hunting weapons owned by his father. But it also said that if he had committed any crime, the party would cooperate in the investigation.