OPINION UAE envoy's inbox reveals anti-Qatar campaign · Arab countries and placed 30th on global...

A Champions Trophy sans WI makes Sir Viv 'sad'

Mideast carriers post 10.8% traffic

rise in April

BUSINESS | 22 SPORT | 26

Volume 22 | Number 7182 | 2 RiyalsSunday 4 June 2017 | 9 Ramadan 1438 www.thepeninsulaqatar.com

I was hesitating to talk about the recent hacking of Qatar News Agency’s (QNA) website which is an attack on my

country, Qatar. The hesitation was not because of fear of anyone but because of the amazing and shocking media propaganda committed with immaturity and recklessness. Nobody knows whether it was a slip and the campaigners will wake up from their slumber and face the reality, or whether they will continue their slander, fabrication and distortions of news and statements. As a media professional who is aware of every detail of this profession, I realized that there is a plan hatched for a long time to target Qatar. We have learned from our religion, tradition and culture and our wise leadership to have good faith and not to treat people in the way they treat you and ignore minor issues and this is the reason that made me hesitate and finally decided to respond to the attacks and media fabrications made at midnight.

Media has a wide range of outlets and versions including radio, TV, print and social media. Talking to the media is something that requires preparations but fake media outlets like Sky News Abdu Dhabi and Al Arabiya did not take more than three hours to host eleven commentators live! It is a big scandal and comedy that undermines the wisdom of their audience and the public in general.

I am not here to disclose the prepaid media game aimed at insulting Qatar because I know that the more the outlets lie and fabricate, the more their rewards.

The GCC societies are aware of what is going on and the wisdom of people here should not be underestimated because they can differentiate between what is false and fabricated and what is real. Anyone following the comments on social media (Twitter and Facebook) can realise how the people in the GCC have become fully aware and it’s difficult for the mercenary media to cheat them.

These are failed media outlets which will work for anyone who will pay them regardless of their reputation, reliability and transparency on issues being discussed.

Doubts have arisen about those drum beaters and the beneficiaries of the recent crisis that has been created intentionally to divide the GCC states at a time of crisis when the region requires close cooperation between sister states.

The major responsibility lies with the leaderships and the people of the Gulf to stand united against conspiracies and I am confident that the public can differentiate between falsehood and truth. It is important to emphasize here that the State of Qatar has nothing to hide regarding its relations with all countries as some provocative and corrupt media outlets are claiming. Qatar has a clear and firm policy based on principles, values and ethics from which it will not deviate while dealing with global affairs.

Qatar will remain ‘a shelter of the oppressed’ as the Emir H H Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani has said. May God save him and keep Qatar in peace and stability.

Dr. Khalid Al-ShafiEditor-in-Chief

OPINION

Propaganda and provocative media

3rd Best News Website in the Middle East

RAMADAN TIMINGToday’s Iftar 6:24pmTomorrow’s Imsak 3:05am

SIX MEMBERS of the Qatari armed forces were injured in the course of their duty as part of the Qatari duty force defending the southern border of the sisterly Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, the Directorate of Moral Guidance at the Ministry of Defence announced. These injuries took place as the Qatari armed forces stationed in the southern bor-der of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia were performing their continuing heroic duty along with their brethren to defeat enemy forces from the Kingdom. The Directorate of Moral Guidance prays to the Almighty Allah for quick recovery for the injured of duty.

Qatar region's most peaceful nationQATAR has topped the Middle East and North African (Mena) region in Global Peace Index (GPI) in 2017 for the ninth year in a row. Qatar retained first place among the Arab countries and placed 30th on global level among 163 countries. The country has scored a rate of 1.664, marking a (0.052) improvement compared to last year.

→ See also page 8

Six members of Qatari Armed Forces wounded

UAE envoy's inbox reveals anti-Qatar campaign

Fazeena Saleem The Peninsula

More people are making healthy food choices during

fasting as demand for health friendly food items such as fruits, fresh juices and yogurt has surged in the last few days. Sale of healthy food items has out-stripped sale of bottled drinks and flavoured bev-erages with high level of sugar, say industry sources.

According to traders the demand for bottled juices increases between five to 10 percent, while sales of fresh fruits go up by nearly 20 percent usually during Ramadan. “The demand was as usual in the first few days of Ramadan, but now it has doubled,” said a represent-ative at the Green Juice, a

place known for variety of freshly extracted juices.

Besides a large variety of fruits, many leading shop-ping outlets are also offering fresh juices, along with the canned and bottled ones. “People start buying fresh juices and fruits from the first day of Ramadan, and we have seen the demand increasing sharply," said a spokesperson at Quality Group International.

A senior official at the Lulu Hypermarket said: “The demand for fruits like, avo-cado, apricot, melon increases during Ramadan. → Continued on page 2

Surge in sale of healthy food items

Real Madrid captain Sergio Ramos lifts the trophy after they defeated Juventus in the UEFA Champions League final football match at The Principality Stadium in Cardiff, south Wales, yesterday. Real Madrid won 4-1. → See also page 28

Real Madrid win Champions League Trophy

The Peninsula

The hacked emails taken from the inbox of the UAE's ambassador to the United States have revealed an anti Qatar

campaign to downgrade the image and importance of the country.

A group of Hackers called "Glo-bal Leaks" yesterday released the

first series of emails taken from the inbox of the UAE's ambassador to the United States, Yousef Al Otaiba. Spokesman for the UAE embassy in Washington has stressed that the ambassador's email was hacked.

The leaks ‘reveal how millions of dollars were used to hurt the rep-utation of American allies and cause policy changes, reported Daily Beast newspaper . Another news

orgnanisation ‘The Intercept’ reported yesterday that the emails, show a close relationship between Al Otaiba and a pro-Israel, neocon-servative think tank — the Foundation for Defense of Democ-racies (FDD).

The hacked emails, some of which dated back to 2014, reveal a high-level of backchannel cooper-ation between the FDD, which is

funded by pro-Israel billionaire Shel-don Anderson, and the Gulf country. They also appear to show clear col-laboration between the FDD and the UAE on a campaign to downgrade the image and importance of Qatar as a regional and global power, including collusion with journalists who have published articles accusing Qatar and Kuwait of supporting "terrorism".→ Continued on page 3

Collaboration between a pro-Israel think tank FDD and the UAE to downgrade the image and importance of Qatar as a regional and global power.

The leak also includes a proposed agenda for an upcom-ing meeting between the FDD and the UAE government scheduled for June 11-14.

Van rams people on London BridgeLONDON:British police rushed to an incident on Lon-don Bridge yesterday after witnesses said a van ploughed into pedestrians and one woman said she saw people who may have had their throats cut.

British Transport Police said casualties were reported after an incident that may have involved a van and a knife attack, the BBC said, while the London Ambulance Serv-ice said it was sending multiple resources to the incident. Police said armed officers were also responding to an inci-dent in the nearby Borough Market area of the city.

02 SUNDAY 4 JUNE 2017HOME

QIC launches free Islamic app for RamadanThe Peninsula

Qatar Insurance, the leading insurance Group in MENA, has launched a free Islamic app as an

offering to the community dur-ing the holy month of Ramadan.

The QIC Islamic app can be downloaded free in both the Android and iOS platforms. Offering access to the verses from the Holy Quran and Islamic literature, the QIC Islamic app provides guidance and religious tips to promote Islamic culture in a modern and accessible manner.

The app which is bundled with many features allows its users to recite the Holy Quran, listen to the recitals of renowned Islamic readers, read the Tafsir (interpretation of the Holy verses) and perform a search by the verse number Ayah.

In addition, the app offers free live streaming of the Quran 24 radio broadcast from Doha, invocations from Hisn Al Mus-lim, a renowned Islamic book, prayer time reminders and assists the user to determine the direction of the Qibla from his

location. Moreover, the app empowers the user with locat-ing the nearest mosque and follow the Ramadan time table making it extremely valuable during the Holy month. It also allows users to locate QIC’s branches in Qatar.

Speaking about the unique feature of the recently launched app, PR & Corporate

Communications Manager at QIC Group said, “Being a Qatari company, we strive to ensure that we uphold the tradition of Qatar at all times. In view of this proposition, the launch of the app especially before Ramadan aligns well with the company's commitment and is a modern and innovative way of giving back to the society.”

Qatar's Permanent Representative to the United Nations, H E Ambassador Sheikha Alia Ahmed bin Saif Al Thani, and the Permanent Representative of Korea to United Nations, Ambassador Cho Tae-yul launch the initiative in New York yesterday.

Qatar-South Korea initiative to form group on education New York

QNA

Qatar and South Korea have launched an initiative to form a group of Friends of

Education for Global Citizenship in a meeting held in New York.

Qatar's Permanent Repre-sentative to the United Nations, H E Ambassador Sheikha Alia Ahmed bin Saif Al Thani, and the Permanent Representative of the Republic of Korea to United Nations Ambassador Cho Tae-yul launched the initiative.

Addressing the meeting, Sheikha Alia said that the initi-ative was launched as part of Qatar's efforts to implement the goals of the 2030 Sustainable Development Plan.

She explained that educa-tion for global citizenship could help to learn to live in peace and would promote respect for all as well as a sense of belong-ing to a common humanity based on integration and respect for human rights. The initiative of forming a group of Friends of Education for

Global Citizenship aims to establish a mechanism to address the threats facing our world today through the rec-ognition of cultural diversity, intercultural dialogue, the pro-motion of tolerance, the promotion of inclusive educa-tion and the fight against terrorism and extremism, she added.

Sheikha Alia pointed out that Qatar had called for supporting education for global citizenship by making education a fertile ground for cultural exchange and constructive dialogue.

The Group aims to work with Member States, academic community, civil society and private organisations that may bring innovative and creative approaches that will improve the quality of education and uphold the principles of the United Nations.

One of the objectives of the Group is to create an informal space for Member States to con-duct consultations and discussions on education issues within the framework of global citizenship and to focus their dialogue on the purpose of reaching policy-making meas-ures for education in order to achieve the goals and objectives of the 2030 Sustainable Devel-opment Plan.

The initiative was welcomed by majority of Member States.

The day of the initiative was attended by a large number of delegates from the permanent members of the United Nations as well as those concerned with strengthening the mechanisms of education for global citizenship.

The app which is bundled with many features allows its users to read the Holy Quran, listen to the recitals of renowned Islamic readers, and read the Tafsir.

QNA

Qatar has strongly con-demned the bombing in the Afghan capital of

Kabul, which resulted in the

death and injury of a number of people.

In a statement yesterday, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs reit-erated Qatar's firm position rejecting violence and terrorism

regardless of motives or reasons. The statement expressed Qatar's condolences to the families of the victims, the government and the Afghan people, and wished the injured a speedy recovery.

Qatar condemns bombing in Kabul

Global citizenship

One of the objectives of the Group is to create an informal space for Member States to conduct consultations and discussions on education issues within the framework of global citizenship.

Intake of fresh juice recommendedContinued from page 1

The official also said that the demand for snacks and cooked food items also increases dur-ing Ramadan especially from people living here without families and those who aren’t fasting.

The risks of heat-related health problems increase with fasting in summer due to a drop in body fluids and salt levels, say health experts.

They have advised suf-ficient intake of healthy drinks during Iftar and Suhoor.Fasting people have also been advised to avoid caffeinated drinks and beverages with high artificial flavours and sugar.

Healthcare Communi-cations Committee on its website has recommended half a cup of fresh juice or a piece of fruit for Suhoor and a cup of orange juice during Iftar.

03SUNDAY 4 JUNE 2017 HOME

A man collects laban, a cooling yoghurt drink, from a tap kept outside the mansion of Sheikh Ghanem Al Thani, near the Ramada Intersection. Pic: Salim Matramkot/ The Peninsula

Laban flows in taps'Emails laid bare mechanism behind high-stakes campaign against Qatar'

Continued from page 1Ziad Jilani, one of the authors of

The Intercept report, told Al Jazeera the emails support previous allega-tions "that there is a growing axis between some of the Gulf countries, like Saudi Arabia and the UAE, and Israel".

David Hearst, the Editor in Chief of Middle East Eye, told Al Jazeera the emails laid bare the "mechanism" behind "a very high stakes campaign that is being launched against Qatar".

Otaiba is well-known figure in US national security circles - he has been

called "the most charming man in Washington" - and has participated in Pentagon strategy meetings at the invitation of the defence officials.

The leaked emails include an exchange in which FDD senior coun-selor John Hannah - a former deputy national security advisor to Vice Pres-ident Dick Cheney - complains to Otaiba that Qatar is hosting a meeting of Hamas at an Emirati-owned hotel.

Otaiba responds that the UAE is not at fault and that the real problem lies with the US military base in Qatar.

He writes: "How's this, you move

the base then we'll move the hotel :-)"The leak also includes a proposed

agenda for an upcoming meeting between the FDD and the UAE gov-ernment scheduled for June 11-14.

The agenda includes in-depth dis-cussions specifically on Qatar, including Qatar-based Al Jazeera, and its links to the Muslim Brotherhood.

One item on the agenda is: "Al Jazeera as an instrument of regional instability".

"They actually discussed recast-ing Al Jazeera as a disruptive network, a network that is causing instability and chaos, rather than recognised good journalism," The Intercept's Jilani told Al Jazeera.

Attendees set to take part in the June meeting include former US Sec-retary of Defense Robert Gates and Mark Dubowitz, CEO of FDD.

Other FDD emails ask for meetings with high-ranking figures including Mohammed bin Zayed - the crown prince who runs the UAE's armed forces - as well as Mohammed Dahlan, a former strongman of the Palestinian Fatah group who now lives in Abu Dhabi. A large portion of the emails focus on "US/UAE polices to positively impact Iranian internal situation" and to "contain and defeat Iranian aggres-sion". Another email in the leak shows the FDD and the UAE looking to pres-sure businesses to pull out of Iran.

In early March, Dubowitz emailed Otaiba a listing non-US businesses operating in Saudi Arabia or the UAE "looking to invest in Iran".

The Daily Beast was reported on Friday that it had been approached by the hackers, who offered a sample of the emails they said demonstrated "how a small rich country/company used lob-byists to hurt American interests and those of it allies". According to the Daily Beast, the hackers said the documents had been provided to them by a paid whistle-blower in a Washington, DC lobbying group and contained emails from Otaiba's Hotmail account.

Qatar provides food aid to Yemenis in AdenAden

QNA

Funded by Qatar Fund for Develop-ment (QFFD), a programme of food assistance and Ramadan Iftar has

been launched at the Al-Sadagah Hospi-tal in the southern Yemeni province of Aden, as part of Qatar's efforts to allevi-ate the suffering of the Yemeni people.

Executive Director of Development Projects at QFFD, Mesfer Al Shahwani, said that the project comes within the frame-work of Qatar's continuous efforts to

support the Yemeni people in alleviating the impact of the crisis raging in the coun-try. Aden is one of the most important provinces for which Qatar has allocated a number of relief and development projects, he added.

Aden is one of the most important provinces for which Qatar has allocated a number of relief and development projects.


Pregnant women urged caution while fastingThe Peninsula

Women who have preg-n a n c y complications such as diabe-

tes, high blood pressure or anaemia are generally advised to avoid fasting during the Holy Month of Ramadan. Breastfeed-ing women are also advised to have a general health check to ascertain their fitness and ensure their baby’s well-being before undertaking fasting, advised experts at Hamad Med-ical Corporation (HMC).

Fasting during the Holy Month of Ramadan is one of the five pillars of Islam, although pregnant and breastfeeding women are exempt if it poses a risk to their health. However, some Muslim women still choose to fast, despite the health implications. Some studies show there is little or no effect on newborn babies whose moth-ers fast during pregnancy. Others suggest health problems later in life, or that fasting in pregnancy can have some effect on the intelligence or academic ability of a child.

“Pregnant women with underlying health conditions should avoid fasting in order to protect themselves and their unborn babies from any further unwanted complications. How-ever, pregnant women who are willing to fast during Ramadan should seek their doctor’s advice throughout the month to make sure that fasting is not affecting their baby,” cautioned Dr Faten El Taher, Senior Consultant in Obstetrics/Gynecology at Wom-en’s Hospital.

According to her, there are some concerns that fasting may affect how well a baby grows in the uterus (womb), or that fast-ing may be linked to premature labour. “There is usually an

increase in the number of preg-nant women visiting our Emergency Department during Ramadan due to fasting.”

“Some studies suggest that more babies are born early if their mothers fast during Ram-adan. If Ramadan coincides with the summer months, this means hot weather and long days, which puts pregnant women at greater risk of dehydration due to a low fluid intake. This could induce premature labour and subsequently lead to preterm births,” Dr El Taher said.

She suggested that fasting

pregnant women should con-tact their doctor as soon as possible if they are not putting on enough weight or are losing weight; become very thirsty, are urinating less frequently, or if their urine becomes dark-col-oured and strong-smelling. This is a sign of dehydration, and it can make them more prone to urinary tract infections (UTIs) or other complications; develop a headache or other pains, or a fever; become nauseous or start vomiting.

She added that they should contact their doctor straight away if: There is a noticeable change in their baby’s move-ments, such as if the baby is not moving around or kicking as much; they notice contraction-like pains. This could be a sign of premature labour; they feel dizzy, faint, weak, confused or tired, even after they have had a good rest.

“If any of the instances above occur, women should break their fast immediately and drink water containing salt and sugar or an oral rehydration solution. They should also con-tact their doctor immediately,” Dr El Taher said.

Meanwhile, Dr Amal Abu Bakr Arbab, Baby-Friendly Hos-pital Initiative Program Lead at Women’s Hospital, said if women are exclusively breast-feeding their babies, they are not expected to fast during Ram-adan. She added that most Muslim scholars believe that women who are breastfeeding have permission not to fast.

“However, if breastfeeding women choose to fast, their baby will not be harmed because they will be able to keep mak-ing breastmilk while they are fasting,” she said.

Dr Arbab noted that if a breastfeeding woman begins to feel unwell, she should break her fast with water and rest.

A Qatar Charity volunteer handing over food to a needy in Somalia.

QC gives food baskets to 4,633 families in drought-hit SomaliaThe Peninsula

Qatar Charity provided food baskets to 4,633 drought-affected families in

Somalia battling for survival.The baskets consist of 25kg

rice, 25kg sugar, 25kg flour, 6 litres of oil, 2.5kg milk powder, and 2 kg dates.

QC continues to provide support to drought-affected areas in Somalia. With the beginning of Ramadan, it has implemented a number of relief projects including the distribu-tion of food items o thousands of drought-affected families, said Faisal Al Fahida, from QC.

“A number of areas of Somalia have been severely affected by drought including Mogadishu and such assistance has to be both extremely timely and essential given the difficult

humanitarian situation they are going through.”

“We hope that such assist-ance will alleviate the harsh conditions they are experienc-ing, Al Fahida added. The beneficiaries thanked the phi-lanthropists, Qatar, and QC for their efforts and support.

It is noteworthy that “Atta Alkher from Doha Alkher” ini-tiative had provided emergency relief during its last visit to Somalia, included food parcels, medicines, and drinking water.

The initiative provided food parcels for 10,000 Somali fam-ilies as well as medical assistance including the distribution of medical solutions, administer-ing medical examinations for internal diseases, malnutrition, and dehydration.

A humanitarian delegation from QC has visited Somalia and

studied the various aspects of the humanitarian situation there. It has launched major relief projects, including the dis-tribution of daily meals for 7,000 families.

As part of emergency relief projects, QC dispatches medi-cal convoys to affected areas of Somalia including Somaliland, Puntland, Mogadishu and south-west territories in order to reduce the spread of epidemics.

Approximately 16,200 per-sons benefited from these medical services especially in the regions that lost many per-sons and millions of livestock due to the lack of food, drugs and drinking water.

Artesian wells will be drilled to provide drinking water for 4,000 persons of the cholera and drought-affected areas.

Case of exemption

Fasting during the Holy Month of Ramadan is one of the five pillars of Islam, although pregnant and breastfeeding women are exempt if it poses a risk to their health. However, some Muslim women still choose to fast, despite the health implications.

Ooredoo is official sponsor of Aspire Ramadan Sports Festival 2017The Peninsula

Ooredoo yesterday announced that it is the Official Sponsor of Aspire

Ramadan Sports Festival 2017.The Aspire Ramadan Sports

Festival started from June 1 and runs until June 14. It will be held in Aspire Dome, Ladies Sports Hall and other outdoor facilities at Aspire Zone, to ensure every-one can enjoy the sporting

festivities and avoid the summer heat.

The festival will include a number of competitions for all ages and genders to promote a healthy lifestyle during the holy month of Ramadan. As Official Sponsor, Ooredoo will be rais-ing awareness of the Festival, as well as the importance of main-taining fitness levels during summer on its social media channels. Talking about the

event, Manar Khalifa Al Muraikhi, Director of Commu-nity & Public Relations, Ooredoo Qatar, said: “Ooredoo is proud to once again work with Aspire Zone Foundation to provide a truly family friendly event. It’s great to know that along with the many festivities that Ram-adan brings, you and your family can still stay fit and active whilst having fun and spending time with loved ones in a

temperature control led environment.”

Nasser Abdulla Al Hajri, Director of PR and Communica-tion at AZF, said: “Ooredoo is one of our strategic partners as we always work together for the benefit of community in Qatar in terms of promoting healthy active lifestyle.” Al Hajri added: “Year after year, our Ramadan Sports Festival has grown to demonstrate Aspire Zone

Foundation’s ability to cater to the varying interests of sports enthusiasts in Qatar all year long and especially in the Holy Month, and we are confident that our partnership with Ooredoo will make it even a more remarka-ble event on the country’s Ramadan agenda.”

The Aspire Ramadan Sports Festival will include a host of activities such as football, vol-leyball, basketball, cricket,

hockey, table tennis and many more.

In addition, to ensure there are activities for every fitness level, a Ramadan-long walking competition will be held under the umbrella of Aspire’s “step into health” programme in Aspire Dome for all ages and genders.

The venue will be open daily from 3:00pm to 5:30pm and 8:30pm to 11:30pm.

Vegetables on display at one of the winter markets.

5,113 tonnes of vegetables sold at marketsThe Peninsula

The winter vegetable farmers’ markets have sold 5,113 tonnes of veg-

etables, 919 tonnes of fruit and over 142 tonnes of fish in 2016/2017 season, according to report issued by the Agri-cultural Affairs Department at the Ministry of Municipality and Environment, yesterday.

There are three such mar-kets — Al Mazrouah, Al Khor and Dakhira and Al Wakra — which started selling products in Octo-ber 2016 to and closed at the end of April this year

The markets offered a wide variety of vegetables and poul-try products sourced from Qatari farms at attractive prices. They provide an oppor-tunity for farmers to sell their

products directly to customers without intervention from middlemen.

The highest proportion of fruit sale was 181 tonnes in December, while the highest proportion of vegetable sale was 1,170 tonnes in March.

The highest proportion of fish sale — 29.8 tonnes — was in March, and the lowest came in October.

Expectant mothers have been asked to exercise care while fasting.


QIB holds Ramadan Ghabga dinnerThe Peninsula

Qatar Islamic Bank (QIB), Qatar’s leading Islamic Bank, organised a Ram-

adan Ghabga dinner for its employees. The Ghabga was attended by Bassel Gamal, QIB Group CEO, QIB’s executive man-agement team as well as the Guest of Honoor, Sheikh Suliaman Al Jubailan. The event, a regular fea-ture on QIB’s calendar, celebrates Ramadan traditions, strengthens relations between employees and brings to life the spirit of the Holy Month.

Commenting on the occa-sion, Gamal said: “At QIB, we understand that our employees are the beating heart of our bank and the annual Ghabga gather-ing is a QIB tradition that allows us to connect with them and

continue enhancing the commu-nication between us.”

“We are pleased to share the joy of Ramadan and the strong sense of community that comes with it with our employees,” he added.

Speaking at the event, Sheikh Sulaiman Al Jubailan

stressed on the importance of respecting Islamic values that call for amity and love and ele-vate humanity, offering real-life examples from his experience.

The evening saw an inter-active question and answer session followed by raffle draws and generous prizes.

32 child heart surgeries by RAF team in AstanaThe Peninsula

A medical team from Sheikh Thani bin Abdullah Founda-t i o n f o r Humanitarian Serv-

ices (RAF) conducted 32 heart surgeries on children in Astana, the capital of Kazakhstan.

The project was part of RAF’s ongoing campaign “Al Qulub Al Saghira” (small hearts) to provide health services to children with heart diseases.

The medical team spent 11 day from May 13 to 23 in Kaza-khstan to complete the surgery. The surgery was conducted in Children’s Heart Surgery Hos-pital at National Scientific Medical Center in Astana.

The project cost of QR450,000 was financed by people in Qatar by donations to rescue the life of benefici-ary children. A total of 32 operations including 12 open

heart surgeries and 20 cardiac catheterisations were con-ducted by RAF’s medical team comprising 20 specialists in surgery, endoscopy, anaesthe-sia and intensive care.

In addition, about 40 med-ical staff from Kazakhstan got the opportunity to interact with the visiting medical team to gain practical experience.

The project was imple-mented in collaboration with Al Baraka foundation, RAF’s local partner in Kazakhstan.

“We collected the cases of children with heart problems from 17 states across the coun-try,” said Solomon of Baghdash, Director of Al Baraka founda-tion. The beneficiary children aged four days to 13 years.

For the first time such a med-ical project has been implemented, said Dr Shuhrat Marasolov, Director of Children's Heart Surgery Hospital, National Scientific Medical Center.

A child after a heart surgery in Kazakhstan.

First week winners of the Ramadan Quiz Contest organised by The Peninsula and Malabar Gold & Diamonds, with Acting Managing Editor of The Peninsula, Mohammed Salim Mohamed (second left); Deputy Head, Malabar Gold & Diamonds branch, Yahiya (third left); and other officials at the awards ceremony held at the newspaper's office, yesterday. Pic: Kammutty VP/ The Peninsula

Ramadan Quiz Contest winners

Social initiative launches monthly donation planThe Peninsula

A social support initiative “ZHAAB” has launched its ‘Thokhor’ campaign

— a monthly donation plan that commenced its activities during the holy month of Ramadan under the title: “To be the best you can be, give all year round with our monthly donation plan”.

‘ZHAAB’ initiative was launched in February 2017 by Qatar Charity Under the patronage of H E Sheikh Joaan bin Hamad Al Thani, to provide support to local communities.

‘Thokhor’, which means generosity, on the part of the donor, is launched as part of “ZHAAB” initiative, to help raise funds to help people in Qatar. The monthly dona-tion plan is set up either by sending an SMS or via account transfer through local banks to facilitate the donation process, and make it more convenient for the donor, said a release.

‘Thokhor’ campaign includes a donation drive which is rolled out through-out multiple Majlises across Qatar.

The rollout consists of separate visits for men and women, with at least two visits occurring each day. The campaign intends to spread awareness of how people can give back to their c o m m u n i t y t h r o u g h “ZHAAB”, while facilitating their participation through its Zokhor programme.

QIB employees at the Ghabga dinner.


THE world’s favourite jeweller is gearing up for a sizzling summer with a 60kg gold giveaway. Joy-alukkas has consistently launched massive pro-motions during summer since it opened its doors 30 years ago and 2017 is no exception. This year’s promotion will see lucky shoppers go home with up to 1kg gold each in daily and weekly draws.

“Historically summer is considered by retailers as the dead season, espe-cially residents often go back to their home coun-tries with the whole family for the school break, but at Joyalukkas we consider this season the perfect opportunity to give our loyal customers more reasons to smile. That’s why we reserve our biggest promotions at this time. It’s our way of giv-ing back to the patrons whose support for the past three decades has made Joyalukkas a global name in high-quality jewellery and service.” said John Paul Alukkas, Executive Director, Joyalukkas Group.

Shoppers get one raf-fle coupon to enter the raffle draw for 60kg gold upon purchase of gold jewellery worth QR500 and above. They also get two raffle coupons on purchase of diamond and polki jewellery. Adding to this exciting opportunity are generous offers and 0% instalment plans from leading banks in partici-pating countries. The summer gold giveaway started on June 1 and it will contiue till July 31.

Joyalukkas unveils Shop & Win gold promotion

Ramadan offers from NBK Automobiles on MercedesThe Peninsula

To celebrate the holy month of Ramadan and showcase its commit-ment to the Qatar community, Nasser Bin

Khaled Automobiles (NBK Auto-mobiles), the authorised general distributor of Mercedes-Benz in Qatar, has launched special offers on many models.

The great value deals are valid on the CLA, GLA, GLE, E 400 and V-Class Mercedes-Benz cars, providing customers with attrac-tive savings to allow them drive their dream car home with the best specifications and highest standards of safety.

Khalid Shaaban, General Manager of NBK Automobiles, said: “In this holy month, Nasser Bin Khaled Automobiles extends its greetings and wishes health and prosperity to all members of the community. We are proudly providing customers with special offers and benefits on Mercedes-Benz models to drive away one of our cars at more affordable prices. These offers reflect NBK Automobiles’ full commitment to the Qatar society and to offer

valued support during the holy month.”

Available during Ramadan and June 2017, the unbeatable prices are an excellent opportu-nity for Mercedes-Benz fans to drive the CLA from QR159,000, GLA from QR139,000, GLE from QR269,000, E 400 from QR269,000 and V-Class from QR249,000. In addition, custom-ers can benefit from free registration, 3 years warranty with unlimited mileage and flex-ible internal and bank financing options.

As part of this special finance offer customers have to pay only 20% down payment at the time of delivery of the vehicle and they can drive the highly desirable

Mercedes-Benz with no further payments due until January 2018.

Additionally, customers can also benefit from Mercedes-Benz Service Solutions offered by Nasser Bin Khaled Automobiles. Customers can choose from two customised packages. The first package is Mercedes-Benz Serv-ice SELECT that covers all scheduled maintenance costs specified by the manufacturer, including filters, operational liq-uids, and labour. The second package is Mercedes-Benz Serv-ice SELECT PLUS, which in addition to the items included in the Mercedes-Benz Service Select, covers a range of wear-and-tear parts.

Mercedes-Benz Service Solu-tions cover all scheduled maintenance procedures at a fixed cost. Customers can pur-chase the package that suit their needs and for varying time-peri-ods, giving them completely transparent maintenance costs which saves them from any unpleasant surprises. The differ-ent packages, provide complete convenience and peace of mind, offering customers service levels that meet their expectations.

The Mercedes-Benz CLA is distinguished with its sporty pro-portions and powerful, dynamic design idiom characterised by sensuously rounded contours that make it unmistakable. Its profile is sleek like a coupé, yet it offers room for five. In undertaking the facelift modifications, the Mer-cedes-Benz designers have subtly honed the distinctive look and upgraded the interior.

The GLA is characterised by its sportily dynamic design idiom, light-footed handling and extensive individualisation range. As the first compact SUV from Mercedes-Benz it brought a breath of fresh air to its

market segment and established itself there as a major player. The GLA has an engine of power that ranges from115 kW (156 hp) to 155 kW (211 hp). The GLE blends tradition and modernity with a luxurious interior ambience and a sportier.

The new GLE is equipped with best on-road and off-road handling, outstanding spacious-ness and high levels of active and passive safety with driver assist-ance systems.

The E 400 is the core of Mer-cedes-Benz brand, and in the past has repeatedly redefined the standards in the executive-class segment. Now it carries this

tradition into the future with a wealth of top-class innovations that take safety, stress relief and comfort to a new level. It is with-out doubt the most intelligent sedan in the executive class.

The V-Class Mercedes-Benz is redefining the MPV. As the youngest and largest member of the passenger car family, it sets new benchmarks in its segment with its design and a host of inno-vations. The V-Class combines room for up to eight people and exemplary functionality with the high-class appeal, comfort, effi-cient driving pleasure and safety that distinguish automobiles bearing the three-pointed star.

Various Mercedes-Benz models on display.

The unbeatable prices on offer include CLA from QR159,000, GLA from QR139,000, GLE from QR269,000, E 400 from QR269,000 and V-Class from QR249,000.

Palestinian filmmaker invited to UN to screen her films on injusticeThe Peninsula

Palestinian filmmaker, Farah Nabulsi, was invited to UN in New York to

screen her three films, high-lighting the injustice faced by Palestinians as 50th anniversary of occupation approaches.

Farah Nabulsi, the film-maker and the daughter of Palestinians living in diaspora, has screened her three short films in the trustee council chambers at the United Nations in New York, where she also addressed attendees, by invita-tion from Ambassador Riyad Mansour, Permanent Observer Mission of the State of Palestine to the United Nations.

The three short films that were screened on Thursday included "Today They Took My Son", which focuses on a mother coping with her young child being taken away by a military system. This imprisonment which involves cruel and

inhumane treatment is sadly something which happens to more than 700 Palestinian chil-dren a year.

Farah's recently released film "Oceans of Injustice" will also be shown.

The films were introduced by Farah and shown to ambas-sadors and dignitaries from all over the world. This event is particularly poignant, as this month, June marks the 50th anniversary of the Israeli mili-tary occupation.

Ambassador Riyad Mansour, Permanent Observer of the State of Palestine to the United Nations, said: “We are honoured to share Farah’s work with the United Nations community as it reflects some of the immense suffering, injustice and oppres-sion endured by the Palestinian people under decades of Isra-el’s brutal foreign military occupation.”

Farah Nabulsi said: "I had always thought I understood the

injustices suffered by my peo-ple. However, witnessing it first-hand during a visit to the Occupied Palestinian Territo-ries changed me in a deep and overwhelming way and I instinctively knew that offering sympathy and the occasional charity was no longer enough.

"Over the past century, the Palestinians have suffered oceans of injustice and when you visit Occupied Palestine you truly come to understand the depth and breadth of how delib-erate, systematic and institutionalised the occupation really is. You come to recognise what is happening and has been happening for decades is, at its essence, a settler colonial enter-prise. I hope my films are able to give the audience even just a glimpse into the very real humiliation, pain and suffering experienced by Palestinian men, women and children every day at the hands of that ideology."

In 2016 Farah founded

Native Liberty, a not-for-profit Media Production company, and Oceansofinjustice.com, an online educational platform, that together aim to re-human-ise the Palestinians and draw

attention to the injustices they face.

Farah continues to show-case her groundbreaking work at film festivals, universities and events around the world.

Ambassador Riyad Mansour, Permanent Observer of the State of Palestine to the United Nations, and Palestinian filmmaker Farah Nabulsi at a meeting in New York.

Centrepoint brings home and fashion range for Eid festivitiesThe Peninsula

Centrepoint, the region’s larg-est fashion retailer, is one of the few brands to create a

special Ramadan collection keep-ing in mind the needs of the regional customer. This year, the brand has put together a selection of fashion, kidswear, footwear, accessories, cosmetics and home décor, that will have all eyes on customers.

Be the perfect host at homeThe season of Ramadan brings

with a time for loved ones to come together as families and friends gather for Iftar and Suhoor. Make your home a setting of style and elegance, with Lifestyle’s collec-tion of Ramadan inspired décor, furnishing and home fragrances. Customised Arabic calligraphy has been interwoven in to the design of the collection that evokes the positive feelings one experiences during Ramadan.

The fragrance of a home plays an essential role in setting the mood for a perfect Iftar. Choose from a range of scents including

the traditionally popular Oud and Amber fragrances in a range of products from essential oils to electric and reed diffusers to gift sets to make you the perfect host or delightful guest.

Ramadan-ready modest fashion for women and men

Dress to impress with Splash’s festive collection for the holy month and Eid celebrations. Mod-esty and grace play a key role in inspiring the women’s fashion col-lection that features long silhouettes with a modern aura and fresh colours and prints. Easy flowing lines are complemented by volume sleeves, setting the

ground for a dramatic mood. The men’s collection for the season is classic with modern tailoring touches for a perfect sharp and dressed up look. Shaded prints and new hardware trims lends pizzazz to the range.

Junior style for the seasonDress your little princess in

Babyshop’s beautiful collection of party dresses in summer whites and soft pastel shades of peach, melon, pink and pale gold offset by brighter fuschia and green. The range showcases tapestry-inspired vintage floral prints in mesh-enclosed floral dresses, maxi jumpsuits, prom dresses, and

2-piece skirt and trouser sets. The collection for well-groomed boys this season sees a more relaxed and com-fortable vibe keeping in mind the Summer heat. Pastel pinks, dove grey and bur-gundy along with

pin-stripes feature in soft basket-weave fabrics. The collection highlights are collarless and short collared shirts, turn up shorts, washed chinos, half placket shirts, mock polos, shorts with suspenders and pleated trousers for an easy summer vibe.

Festive footwear & accessoriesLadies you can put your most

fashionable foot forward this sea-son with Shoe Mart’s selection of footwear styles that will ensure you can go through the day and evening with ease and style. Beau-tiful bows, Sequins and pearls embellish the season’s range of sti-letteos, sneakers and sandals as

well as hand bags and feminine backpacks.

The Men’s footwear collection focuses on casual summer style options in sporty sneakers, strapped sandals, casual loafers, canvas trainers

Handbags in natural leather in a range of tan tones are the pick of this season. Floral prints and mineral and gemstone fixtures and end pieces contrast with pol-ished metals add a touch of luxury to minimalist hardware.

Must-have makeup for Ramadan nights

As the humidity and high tem-peratures soar, City Lifestyle’s range of colour cosmetics pro-motes glowing skin, vibrant glossy lips, and a soft nude colour palette for the face and eyes. The range of highlighters and illuminators add glow and dimension to cheeks. For lips, while matte fin-ish remains a popular choice, glossy, shiny and glittery lip col-ours are on trend this season so shop now for a dewy day and evening look or a glamorous night out.


QU to celebrate graduation of 40th batch in OctoberThe Peninsula

Under the patronage of Emir H H Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, Qatar Uni-versity (QU) will

hold the men’s graduation cer-emony of Class of 2017 on October 10. The women’s cere-mony will be held on October 11 under the patronage of H H Sheikha Jawaher bint Hamad bin Suhaim Al Thani, wife of the Emir.

This year, around 4,000 stu-dents — 1,000 men and 3,000 women — will be graduating. This is the 40th batch of students to graduate from QU.

Commenting on the upcom-ing event, Qatar University Vice-President for Student Affairs Dr Khalid Al Khanji expressed his appreciation for

the Emir’s visionary leadership and support for QU students, saying, “The graduation of the 40th batch of students comes after years of dedication and hard work during which QU has accomplished many achieve-ments in regional and international university rankings."

"The University has also been

successful in its accreditation ini-tiatives, earning the endorsement of numerous leading interna-tional accrediting bodies for its colleges and academic programs. Additionally, QU has notched up a number of ISO certifications for its research labs and manage-ment systems. This had a positive impact on the level of compe-tency of QU graduates, and reflects the University’s commit-m e n t t o g r a d u a t e highly-qualified students who meet the labor market’s expec-tations,” Dr Khalid Al Khanji said.

Since its inception in 1973, QU has served as Qatar’s primary institution of higher education. With more than 17,000 students in its ranks, it is today a beacon of higher education and aca-demic and research excellence.

QU is committed to provid-ing high-quality education in

areas of national priority. With 79 specialisations at the under-graduate and graduate levels, QU offers the widest range of aca-demic programs in Qatar

tailoring them to meet the needs of Qatari society.

QU hosts nine colleges — Arts and Sciences (CAS); Business and Economics (CBE); Education

(CED); Engineering (CENG); Health Sciences (CHS); Law (LAWC); Medicine (CMED); Phar-macy (CPH); and Sharia and Islamic Studies (CSIS).

The Qatar University building.

This year, around 4,000 students — 1,000 men and 3,000 women — will be graduating. This is the 40th batch of students to graduate from QU.

08 SUNDAY 4 JUNE 2017HOME / MIDDLE EAST

Children playing atop a cannon at Wakra Souq Waqif yesterday as parents and other onlookers watch. Pic: Abdul Basit/ The Peninsula

Cannon at Wakra Souq WaqifQafco organises 'Layali Al Khair' with Eid CharityThe Peninsula

Qafco welcomed the holy month of Ram-adan by organising 'Layali Al Khair' in coordination with

Sheikh Eid Bin Mohammad Al Thani Charitable Foundation (Eid Charity) here at Qafco’s Al-Banush Club, Mesaieed.

'Layali Al Khair' started with a brief opening ceremony on the evening of Thursday, 6th Ram-adan. The opening ceremony of 'Layali Al Khair' was held in the presence of Qafco senior man-agement; the officials from Eid Charity, and general public. The event was also attended by a number of expatriates converted to Islam.

Maryam Mattar, Public Rela-tions & Communications Manager at Qafco, said: “The company takes such religious events as an opportunity to organise activities with the aim of increasing the spirit of solidarity and brother-hood among people.”

She further added, “Various lectures have been organised

during the programme to spread awareness on the virtues of the holy month. Apart from that, we have also ensured many educa-tional and cultural programmes targeting children to help instil the values embedded with the holy month.”

Mattar added: "The Qafco Ramadan programme has come under the context of the com-pany's sense of its social responsibility and in harmony with the spirit of the holy month which aims to spread the values of compassion among all soci-ety members.”

Mattar said: “Through such events we can enhance the spirit of bonding and further reinforce the relationships between com-munity members.”

'Layali Al Khair' is scheduled to be held every Thursday and Friday evening,till the 28th day of the holy month of Ramadan in Al Banush Club Mesaieed.,

The activities during the event will include a variety of religious, educational and cul-tural programmes as well as a competition on the Holy Quran.

The winners of the Holy Quran competition will be announced on the last evening of the Lay-ali Al Khair. Apart from that, the participants will pray “Al Taraweeh prayers” all through the six evenings of the pro-gramme with Sheikh Ahmed Taman from Egypt. The pro-gramme will conclude with understanding the definition of Islam in different languages.

In addition to the religious and cultural competitions and programmes, there will be many other fun activities, games and competitions for children, and collections of prizes and gifts from Qafco to the general public.

In addition to Al Banush Club Restaurant, three well-known restaurants and cafes in Qatar will participate in the Lay-ali Al Khair activities by opening outlets for food and beverages.

It is worth to mention that Qafco's events, celebrations of religious, national and sports events are not limited to the par-ticipation of its employees, but extended to the general public.

Officials cutting the ribbon at the opening of 'Layali Al Khair' at Qafco’s Al-Banush Club in Mesaieed.

Battle for IS Syria bastion Raqqa to begin 'in days'Beirut

AFP

The battle to capture the Islamic State group's Syr-ian bastion Raqqa will

begin "in days", a militia spokes-woman said yesterday after fresh advances by a Kurdish-Arab alliance battling the militants.

The US-backed Syrian Dem-ocratic Forces (SDF) began an operation to capture Raqa last November and has gradually closed in on the city, seizing a town and dam to the west over-night and yesterday.

Their fighters are now within a few kilometres of the militants stronghold to the north, east and west, and are expected to launch their final assault soon. "We will begin in a few days," said Jihan Sheikh Ahmed, spokeswoman for the SDF's "Wrath of the Euphrates" operation to capture Raqqa.

SDF fighters have already sealed off the approaches to

Raqqa from the north and east, and are close to doing the same with the western approach after new advances.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitor said the SDF captured the town of Mansura late Friday and the adjacent Baath Dam on the Euphrates River, around 20 km west of Raqqa, yesterday.

"This advance will allow the SDF to expand its control on the southern banks of the Euphra-tes River and stabilise the western front of Raqqa before launching the final battle to expel IS from the city," Observ-atory director Rami Abdel Rahman said. "We're nearing the major battle," he added.

Abdel Rahman said comb-ing operations were ongoing in Mansura and at the dam to "dis-mantle mines and search for remaining jihadists".

SDF spokesman Talal Sello said the advances on the west-ern front were part of the final stage of operations before the

assault on Raqqa begins. He said the SDF had received "weapons and advanced equipment from the international coalition... as part of preparations for the launch of the battle for Raqqa, which is close".

An AFP correspondent in Ain Issa, a key staging ground for SDF operations, saw a convoy of armoured vehicles driven by foreign advisers from the US-led coalition against the militants group. Trucks carry-ing bulldozers and other machinery were also in the con-voy. Sello said the SDF would launch the attack from the north, west and east of Raqqa.

"The SDF has already com-pleted the siege from the northern and eastern sides and is working to complete the siege from the west," he added.

The SDF is fighting with broad support from the US-led coalition, which has provided air cover, assistance from spe-cial forces on the ground and weaponry.

Qatar tops Mena region in Global Peace IndexThe Peninsula

Qatar has topped the Middle East and North African (Mena) region in Global Peace Index (GPI) in 2017 for the

ninth year in a row. Qatar retained first place

among the Arab countries and placed 30th on global level among 163 countries. The coun-try has scored a rate of 1.664, marking a (0.052) improvement compared to last year.

Qatar has maintained its first ranking in the Middle East and North Africa during the past years (2009 - 2017) and has been ranked best internation-ally in the same period by achieving high rates of evalua-tion that outshined many

developed countries.Iceland remains the most

peaceful country in the world, a position it has held since 2008. Iceland is followed by New Zea-land, Portugal, Austria, and Denmark, all of which were ranked highly in the 2016 GPI.

The report, issued by the London Institute for Economics and Peace in collaboration with the Center for Peace and Con-flict Studies at the University of Sydney has listed Qatar as the only country in the Middle East and North Africa region among the 50 most secure countries in the world. This reflects Qatar's global security status, which is consistent with Qatar National Vision 2030 and the Ministry of Interior's strategy to enhance security and security at the state level.

According to the report, Qatar has maintained its high score in many indicators like low crime rates, low murder rates, low prison numbers, stable polit-ical conditions and a society free of terrorism, good international

relations and nonappearance of internal or external threats or conflicts.

The World Peace Index is based on a set of criteria that comprise several aspects, includ-ing the internal and external affairs of countries such as polit-ical stability, the extent of crime in society, the level of respect for human rights, terrorist crimes on the territory of the State, the extent of participation in support of peacekeeping forces, the mil-itary capabilities of the State, the spread of corruption and the available space for freedom of information and participation of women in public life and politi-cal life and the extent of health care provided to the people and education opportunities, etc.

The Global Peace Index is an

attempt to measure the relative peace status of countries and regions. It is produced by the Institute for Economics and Peace, in consultation with an international team of peace experts, institutes and research centres in collaboration with the Center for Peace and Conflict Studies at the University of Syd-ney, Australia.

Countries are ranked on a scale of 1-5 degrees so that the most stable country is 1 and the least stable is 5.

Qatar’s high ranking in the report for the last nine years con-firms its superiority in many international reports and indi-cators during the last period, most notably the index of the saf-est and most peaceful countries in the world that placed Qatar

second globally and the first among Arab countries, the Glo-bal Competitiveness Index (18th globally and the second among Arab countries), and the Arab Economic Competitiveness Index (First in Arab).

In 2017, Qatar scored 99.1% in applying the guidelines of annex 17 on Safeguarding Inter-national Civil Aviation against Acts of Unlawful Interference. Qatar also scored 96.76% in implementing safety manage-ment and a 100% in annex nine on facilitation. In addition, Qatar was ranked first in the Arab world and 33 globally in the Human Development Report 2016 of the United Nations Development Program. It also ranked first in quality education.

Qatar retained first place among the Arab countries and placed 30th on global level among 163 countries. The country has scored a rate of 1.664, marking a (0.052) improvement compared to last year.

Ramadan celebrations at M�ovenpick Hotel Al AziziyahThe Peninsula

To mark the holy month this year and break the fast in style, M�ovenpick Hotel Al

Aziziyah invites guests to an authentic Ramadan Iftar in the relaxed, family-friendly setting of Flavours restaurant.

From sunset, guests will enjoy the lavish Iftar menu, offering an extensive range of Arabic delicacies, including fam-ily favourites such as biryani and

lamb ouzi, complemented by international cuisines and live cooking stations, with Ramadan beverages. Expect all the tradi-tional Ramadan festivities for dessert, too, from umm ali to baklawa and cheese kunafa.

Every day the extensive buf-fet menu will feature a special station, offering the most indul-gent selection of culinary delights from across the Middle East. Changing daily, a dedicated buf-fet corner will feature dishes

from Qatar, Lebanon, Morocco, Jordan, Syria and Egypt, as well as the finest treats from Turkey. With so many choices in splen-did surroundings, all guests are promised a journey of culinary discovery and exquisite moments when breaking the fast.

“M�ovenpick Hotel Al Azizi-yah celebrates the holy month of Ramadan with traditional fes-tivities that promise to delight everyone,” said Musa Al Nam-mari, Hotel Manager, M�ovenpick

Hotel Al Aziziyah. “The hotel offers families and corporate groups the perfect place to gather around and celebrate the values that make Ramadan a truly spe-cial occasion. Our hotel is proud to be family-oriented and respectful of local culture, tradi-tions and all associated celebrations.”

Priced at QR180 per person, the Iftar buffet is available from sunset until 9pm. Groups can take advantage of group

discounts. Meanwhile, suhoor is served from 10pm to 1.30am at QR120 per person. Special set

menus for Iftar and Suhoor are also available through room service.

09SUNDAY 4 JUNE 2017 MIDDLE EAST / AFRICA

Benghazi

Reuters

Libyan forces loyal to eastern-based com-mander Khalifa Haftar said they had taken the strategic military base

of Jufra yesterday after rival fac-tions withdrew.

The move consolidates con-trol for Haftar’s self-styled Libyan National Army (LNA) over the central desert regions of Jufra and Sabha, where they have recently taken a string of towns and bases.

It could also be a key step in the LNA’s stated goal of moving towards the capital, Tripoli.

On Friday, after the LNA entered towns just south of Jufra military base, its spokesman said its forces would gradually move towards the town of Bani Walid,

nearly 350km northwest of Jufra.Jufra is just over 500km

southwest of Benghazi, and about the same distance south-east of Tripoli.

The LNA is aligned with a parliament and government

based in eastern Libya that have rejected a U.N.-backed admin-istration in Tripoli.

Haftar met the head of the UN-backed Government of National Accord (GNA) a month ago in Abu Dhabi, pledging to calm tensions in the south and producing hopes of a political deal that could stabilise the country.

But two weeks later violence escalated in Jufra and Sabha after dozens of fighters loyal to the LNA were killed last month in a raid on Brak Al Shati air base near Sabha city.

Brigades aligned with the GNA and the Benghazi Defence Brigades (BDB), a force that includes Islamists and other fighters who have fled the LNA’s advances since last year in the eastern city of Benghazi, have since retreated from the area.

Mohamed Al Afirs, spokes-man for the LNA’s 12th Brigade, said his men had found Jufra base deserted when they entered late in the morning. Local forces aligned with the LNA had clashed with the BDB on Friday, but the

BDB then withdrew towards Mis-rata, LNA officials said.

The latest LNA advances came after heavy LNA air strikes on Jufra. Egypt has also carried out air strikes in Jufra, as well as in the far eastern city of Derna,

which it said targeted militants linked to an attack on Coptic Christians in the southern Egyp-tian province of Minya.

However, analysts say the strikes appear partly designed to help Haftar, a close ally of Egypt.

East Libyan forces take desert air base

Jerusalem

AFP

Successive Israeli govern-ments have invested billions of dollars over the

past 50 years on settlements in the occupied West Bank, mak-ing any withdrawal from the Palestinian territory a costly proposition.

There is no official overall figure for Israel's spending on Jewish settlements since the June 1967 Six-Day War.

Each year, the finance min-istry has published partial figures, amounting to $3.5bn over the 12 years up to 2015, but the sum does not include invest-ments before 2003.

It also does not cover the vast amounts spent on infrastructure such as special roads reserved

for settlers and on their security.

More than 600,000 settlers live among 2.9 million Palestin-ians in the West Bank and annexed east Jerusalem, with frequent outbreaks of violence.

The figures also do not include the Gaza Strip which Israel also captured in 1967 but from where its army and settlers pulled out in 2005.

The settlements, which are deemed illegal under interna-tional law, are widely seen as a key obstacle to peace between Israel and the Palestinians. No Israeli government, however, has turned its back on the settlers.

Roby Nathanson, head of the Macro Center for Political Eco-nomics, which publishes reports on settlements, estimates the

total costs since June 1967 as $20bn. The total surface area of settlements construction in the West Bank has doubled in 18 years, according to the non-governmental organisation.

As a financial incentive for the expansion of settlements, the average settler receives three times more in public subsidies than a resident of Israel proper within its pre-1967 borders.

Shlomo Swirski of the Adva Center, another NGO, estimates that Israel spent $15.2bn between 1988 and 2015 alone.

"This burden has contributed to deepening social inequality in as much as the money goes to settlements and their defence at the expense of social budgets," he said.

Despite the huge sums

injected into settlements, several activists favourable to the crea-tion of an independent Palestinian state argue that set-tlements are not irreversible.

The Israeli economy has the means to finance the resettle-ment inside the country of 100,000 Jews, according to Gilad Sher, a former close aide to ex-prime minister Ehud Barak, estimating the cost at $10bn.

Sher, a founder of Blue-White Future which advocates "the Jewish and democratic future of Israel", was referring to the number of residents of iso-lated West Bank settlements which are considered the most likely to be evacuated under any two-state peace settlement with the Palestinians.

The political consensus in

Israel favours annexation of the large settlement blocs which are home to 300,000 Jews.

"We have drawn up a detailed and credible plan on the removal of 100,000 settlers" because the government has refused to do so despite an offi-cial recommendation dating back to 2010, said Sher.

"Our conclusions are clear: the situation is by no means irre-versible. Economic options exist for the implementation of a solu-tion of two states for two peoples."

Nathanson said it was "per-fectly possible" to envisage a withdrawal of 100,000 settlers in phases over a period of two to three years.

"The problem is not an eco-nomic one, it is above all political," he said.

Tunis

AFP

The brother of a shepherd whose beheading by jihadists outraged Tunisia

has himself been found dead after being abducted, media reports and the defence minis-ter 's spokesman said yesterday.

Khalifa Soltani was kid-napped on Friday in the Mount Mghilla area, and a security sweep recovered his body after a "terrorist group" announced his abduction, Belhassen Oues-lati said.

The Islamic State group claimed responsibility, accord-ing to the SITE Intelligence Group which monitors extrem-ist organisations. It quoted the IS Amaq agency as saying the man killed on Friday was a "spy... who worked for the ben-efit of the Tunisian intelligence on Mount Mghilla".

Oueslati did not provide fur-ther details about the victim, but media reports said he was the brother of Mabrouk Soltani, a 16-year-old shepherd who was decapitated on November 13, 2015. The Tunisian branch of IS, Jund Al Khilafa (soldiers of the

caliphate), claimed that killing, accusing the boy of betraying their movements to the army.

Nessma television said Kha-lifa Soltani's body was taken to a hospital in the central Kasser-ine region for an autopsy.

Prime Minister Youssef Chahed has called for a man-hunt for the perpetrators and asked Defence Minister Farhat Horchani to head to the area, the channel said. The leftist Popu-lar Front, meanwhile, called for a demonstration in Tunis "to denounce terrorism" and show solidarity with the Soltani family.

Johannesburg

AFP

South Africa's main oppo-sit ion party, the Democratic Alliance, yes-

terday suspended former leader Helen Zille over Twitter mes-sages in which she said colonialism had brought ben-efits to the country.

The DA, which won 22 per-cent of the vote in the last general election, hopes to make major gains in the 2019 elec-tion but it has struggled to shed its image as a "white" party.

Zille, who is the current premier of Western Cape prov-ince, unleashed fierce criticism from her own party and oppo-nents. South Africa remains deeply divided more than 20 years after the end of white-minority apartheid rule, as stark racial inequality leaves millions of black people with poor hous-ing, education and job opportunities.

Mmusi Maimane, the DA's first black leader, said Zille's social media posts and other

public statements "in connec-tion with colonialism undermine our reconciliation project".

"Ms Zille's original tweets and subsequent justifications have damaged our standing in the public mind," he said.

"Our public representatives must, at all times, be sensitive to the legitimate anger that people still feel about our past and its legacy."

The DA, which promotes a liberal, equal-opportunity mes-sage, is pushing hard to broaden its appeal among black voters. But it has been bruised by social media scandals as the party tries to take advantage of the declining popularity of the rul-ing African National Congress (ANC).

"For those claiming legacy of colonialism was ONLY neg-ative, think of our independent judiciary, transport infrastruc-ture, piped water," Zille wrote on Twitter in March.

She was suspended from the party until a disciplinary hearing is completed.

South Africa opposition suspends former leader

MANAMA: Hackers took over the Twitter account of the Bahraini foreign minister yes-terday. The hack, which purported to be carried out in the name of a fringe militant group, came after the Bah-raini authorities dissolved the kingdom's last major opposi-tion movement and after police shot dead five protest-ers while dispersing a long-running sit-in.

The foreign ministry con-firmed the hack, blaming it on the "terrorist party," without elaborating. Yesterday's hackers tagged their posts with the name and logo of Saraya Al Mukhtar, a Shia militant group with a strong online presence.

Billions spent on settlers since Israel captured West Bank

Lesotho votes in third election in five yearsMASERU: Voters in the small southern African kingdom of Lesotho cast ballots yester-day in an election expected to lead to another fractious coalition government and the risk of deepening instability.

It is the third general elec-tion since 2012 in Lesotho, where years of political in-fighting have undermined attempts to tackle dire pov-erty and unemployment.

Beheaded Tunisian shepherd's brother dead

Bahrain foreign minister's Twitter account hacked

Ahmed Al Mesmari, a spokesman of Libya's opposition armed forces which are made up of militias and some units of the national army based in the east of the country, speaks at a press conference in the coastal city of Benghazi, yesterday.

Mosul

Reuters

Dozens of dead bodies of civilians killed while flee-ing an Islamic State-held

neighborhood in Mosul were lying yesterday in a street close to the front line with Iraqi armed forces, a Reuters TV crew reported.

The bodies belonged to men, women and children. Bags in which they carried their belong-ings were strewn around the street leading out of the Zanjili districts, one of three still in the hands of Islamic State in Mosul.

Hundreds others managed to reach the government lines, some wounded and some car-rying apparently dead bodies in blankets.

Many dead while fleeing IS in Mosul

Wounded displaced Iraqi children who fled from clashes get treatment in western Mosul, yesterday.

The move consolidates control for eastern-based commander Khalifa Haftar's self-styled Libyan National Army (LNA) over the central desert regions of Jufra and Sabha, where they have recently taken a string of towns and bases.

Gambian protesters clash with troopsBANJUL: A Gambian protester died of gunshot wounds yester-day, the day after being shot as supporters of former Gambian leader Yahya Jammeh clashed with West African forces.

Gambian information minister, Demba Ali Jawo, said that a group of people had protested on Friday in Jammeh's home vil-lage of Kanilai, 100 kilometres (60 miles) east of the capital Banjul, over the presence West African ECOMIG forces in the area.

US President Donald Trump has postponed his decision to move the US embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. The pace of developments after Trump’s election and his pre-

election rhetoric pitching himself as the greatest friend of Israel had caused concern that he would act on his promise to shift the embassy to Jerusalem, thus creating extraordinary roadblocks in his own much trumpeted plan to find a solution to the Palestinian-Israeli crisis. So the postponement should come as a surprise and relief to Palestinians and the supporters of their cause all over the world, but at the same time the move is in line with Trump’s tradition of somersaults acquired in the brief period he has been in office.

But whatever the reasons that led Trump to the new decision, there is no doubt that his visit to the region has helped him get a first-hand knowledge of the Middle East situation. Leaders from our region convincingly argued with Trump that shifting the US embassy at this stage would have disastrous consequences than benefits. He must have weighed the facts presented by these leaders against those presented by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his supporters, and finally agreed with the Arab point of view. It’s also a fact that Trump has rescued his own planned peace initiative

by going back on his misconceived promise. The relocation would upend, even if it happens later, decades of US policy by granting de facto US recognition of Israel’s claim to all of Jerusalem as its capital. After such a destructive move, there would be nothing left to negotiate between Israelis and Palestinians. And Palestinians can’t be expected to forfeit their right to freedom and the right to their own land confiscated by Israelis.

A statement issued by the White House, however, said that the president still intends to relocate the embassy to Jerusalem and the actual relocation was a question of time. In that sense, Washington’s decision cannot be called a victory for the Palestinian side, especially since Trump has aligned himself solidly with the Israeli interests with total disregard for Palestinians. But it’s a small victory. It shows that collective bargaining by Arab countries and strong, persuasive diplomacy will produce positive results.

The path is now clear for Trump to launch his peace initiative, though it’s not clear how he is going to do it due to the extreme complications involved in restarting the peace process and secondly, due to Trump’s own problems at home, which are too many. But before he embarks on his ambitious plan, he will have to take a few more steps to gain the confidence of Palestinians and Arabs.

10 SUNDAY 4 JUNE 2017VIEWS

E S T A B L I S H E D I N 1 9 9 6

CHAIRMANSHEIKH THANI BIN ABDULLAH AL THANI

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

[email protected]

ACTING MANAGING EDITORMOHAMMED SALIM MOHAMED

[email protected]

A wise move

QUOTE OF THE DAY

North Korea and its nuclear weapons programme pose a threat to us all. The regime’s actions are manifestly illegal under international law.

Jim MattisUS Defence Secretary

Trump’s decision to delay the shifting of US embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem has brought relief to Palestinians.

Donald Trump’s presidency so far has followed a pattern of disruption. He snubs European allies. He tweets in atrocious grammar. He pulls out of

international agreements. He shakes things up.

But in one important respect, Trump’s presidency appears entirely conventional. That is in the Middle East. Like his recent predecessors, he promised during the presidential campaign to move the US embassy to Jerusalem. And like his predecessors, he violated that promise now that he is in office.

So why did Trump do it? “To maximise the chances of successfully negotiating a deal between Israel and the Palestinians,” according to a White House statement issued Thursday on his decision to sign a waiver of the Jerusalem Embassy Act, that would have set in motion the process for the US moving its embassy to Israel’s capital. It doesn’t get much more conventional than that. What modern president hasn’t tried to maximize the chances of that ever-elusive peace deal?

It would be easy to end the story there. But in this case, Trump has left open the possibility that he will eventually keep his campaign promise: “As he has repeatedly stated his intention to move the embassy, the question is not if that move happens, but only when,” the White House statement also said.

With Trump, it’s never clear what promises, if any, he intends to keep. This is the same guy who campaigned on resetting ties with Russia, only to reach out to Russia’s traditional rival, China, in his first weeks in office. During the transition he signaled he might recognise the sovereignty of Taiwan. Then, of course, he backtracked on that as well.

White House officials tell me that Trump, for now, believes he can use the embassy issue as leverage. Normally this would mean holding out the prospect of moving the embassy as a carrot to the Israelis in exchange for concessions on settlements.

In this case, however, it’s a little different: Trump is using the prospect of an embassy move as a stick with Israel’s Arab neighbors.

It has been reported that Jordan’s King Abdullah, whose country enjoys a peace treaty with Israel, warned Trump that an embassy move would mean riots. This is a familiar refrain for anyone who has followed this issue. The vaunted Arab Street will rise up if America deigns to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital.

Let’s leave aside for a moment that this provides a heckler’s veto on US policy toward the world’s only Jewish state. In another sense, it means that Trump is calling a longstanding bluff. If US recognition is so

Trump left the door open for a Jerusalem embassyEli LakeBloomberg

bad for you, then help me help you avoid that, for the time being.

One White House official told me Trump is eyeing current discussions between Israel, Jordan and Egypt in this respect. This would allow Israel to sell natural gas to its neighbors, and pave the way for more agreements to allow Jordanian and Egyptian nationals to work in Israel as well as deals to share water resources.

Most important, though, Trump is banking on Jordan and Egypt to pressure the Palestinians in the peace negotiations his advisers would like to see restarted.

So far, there are signs that a new peace process is in the works. The Palestinians are said, for example, to have dropped their preconditions for negotiations with Israel.

That alone is progress. Under President Barack Obama, the Palestinians demanded at first a

settlement freeze and then later the return of Palestinian prisoners — some of whom had killed US citizens.

All of that said, there are many

obstacles at the moment for getting peace talks going. To start, the current Israeli government is comprised of political parties that range from skeptical to hostile on the idea of land for peace. Even if Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu wanted a final status solution to the conflict, it’s unlikely his government could deliver it.

Then there is Mahmoud Abbas, the president of the Palestinian Authority. He hasn’t stood for an election since 2005. His political party was ousted from Gaza a decade ago.

And he has yet to make any concession on Trump’s request to end incitement to violence against Jews, to say nothing of the authority’s program to pay off the families of suicide bombers and other terrorists.

This is why most Middle East experts say the time isn’t right to push for a final deal that would create a Palestinian state out of the territory Israel won in the 1967 war.

Those same experts would caution Trump against moving the embassy or otherwise signaling US recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s

capital. Given Trump’s defiance of the experts on the peace process, it’s entirely plausible that sometime in the future he will also defy them on Jerusalem. You could say it would follow a pattern.

The writer is a Bloomberg view

columnist. He was the senior national

security correspondent for the Daily

Beast and covered national security and

intelligence for the Washington Times,

the New York Sun and UPI.

Trump has left open the possibility that he will eventually keep his campaign promise: “As he has repeatedly stated his intention to move the embassy, the question is not if that move happens, but only when.

ED ITOR IAL

A photo taken from East Jerusalem shows a view of Israel’s controversial separation barrier dividing Jerusalem from the West Bank city of Abu Dis, and in the distance the Jordanian capital, Amman.

11SUNDAY 4 JUNE 2017 OPINION

weakening their emissions reduction pledges or simply failing to meet them.

Trump’s reasoning for pulling out rests on one demonstra-bly false premise — that climate change isn’t happening — and one premise that is, at best, very questionable: that burning more fossil fuels would be better for growing GDP, employ-ment and wages in the near and medium term. But even if you accepted Trump’s premises, the nonbinding nature of the agreement means that we could have stayed in it without harming our economy. In his announcement of the decision Thursday afternoon, Trump referred to “the draconian eco-nomic burdens imposed on our country” and “onerous energy restrictions.” Both of those are simply imaginary.

But our withdrawal will cause real harm to US interests, including those that Trump claims to care about. Pulling out tells the rest of the world that there will be wild oscillations in global diplomatic policy between administrations, which reduces Trump’s own ability as president to influence other countries. It also means that other countries are even more dis-couraged from meeting, increasing or exceeding their own Paris targets for emissions reductions and transitioning to clean energy. For the United States to fail to hit our targets is one thing; walking away from the whole endeavor altogether sends a much worse signal about the long-term prospects of successful global cooperation in averting catastrophic climate change.

And by any metric, the United States would benefit from other nations transitioning to clean energy. Even if you buy

World’s most neglected conflict rages on in the CAR

Last month, I sat down with Monica, a 30-year-old polio survivor in Bambari, a war-torn town in the Central African Republic. She was living in a displace-ment camp after intense fighting forced

her to flee the town of Bakala, 110 kilometres away. “I went into the house to hide,” she said, describing the Bakala violence. “My husband told me to stay there and he left with the kids to hide outside. They were chased into the bush and killed.”

In the camp, Monica — who can’t walk - is alone and struggles to find food. She is haunted by the memory of her husband and three children, ages 2, 3 and 4. “I have lost everything,” she said. “These men who kill us …they treat us as if our lives are worth nothing. Will they ever know what they have done?”

Violence in the Central African Republic has fallen from the world’s radar, but that does not mean the killings have let up. Over a dozen armed groups now roam the country commit-ting a range of abuses. Violence is on the rise in the eastern provinces and impunity still reigns.

A comprehensive new report by the UN, released this week, makes the extent of the devas-tation abundantly clear. It should draw urgently needed attention to this bloody crisis and spur action to help it end.

The 369-page “Mapping Report” documents serious violations of human rights and

international humanitarian law from 2003 to 2015, and in the Central African Republic the task was immense. An eight-member team conducted field investigations and combed through 1,200 documents. They cover 620 crimes “of the most serious gravity” committed by various parties, including village burnings, killings and rape.

The report establishes a timeline for the vio-lence from the rule of former President François Bozize up to when the Seleka armed group that overthrew Bozize fractured into different armed bands.

But the report is not just an exercise for the his-torical record. It was written with an eye towards ensuring justice for the crimes it documents: a road map for prosecutors to hold those responsible for serious crimes to account.

On the international level, the International

Criminal Court (ICC) opened investigations in Sep-tember 2014 and this document will facilitate its work. However, the ICC will most likely only target a handful of suspects.

The task of dealing with many of the other crimes falls to the Special Criminal Court(SCC), a unique judicial body established in the Central Afri-can Republic in 2015.

With national and international judges and prosecutors, the court has a mandate to investigate and prosecute grave human rights violations in the country since 2003. Together with the ICC, the SCC offers a meaningful opportunity to break the cycles of impunity that have plagued the country for years.

The special court, the government and the United Nations now effectively have a road map for action. The mapping report does not establish indi-vidual criminal responsibility, but it highlights

President Trump’s decision to pull out of the Paris climate agree-ment serves no practical purpose. It has no benefit other than pandering to the conserva-

tive movement’s ideological opposition to multilateralism and environmental regu-lation. Even Trump’s own stated policy goals would be better served by staying in the agreement.

Set aside the argument that walking out of the 2015 global deal to mitigate cli-mate change is immoral. However compelling, that point rests on assump-tions Trump plainly does not share: that climate science is real and that rich coun-tries should not ruin the lives of the world’s poorest people. Trump ran on rejecting climate science and putting “America First.” Although most Americans actually accept climate science and sup-port action to mitigate climate change, Trump won on that platform, and he can’t realistically be expected to suddenly start caring about the planet.

But he also ran on promises that were not so much about a coherent policy pro-gram as a set of results: faster economic growth, a stronger manufacturing sector and enhanced American power and pres-tige on the global stage.

And leaving Paris impedes, rather than achieves, those goals.

Trump didn’t have to exit the climate agreement to live up to his promise to end the “War on Coal.” He could just have removed President Barack Obama’s domestic climate regulations such as the Clean Power Plan, which he is doing any-way. Contrary to White House claims, nothing in the Paris agreement requires any specific climate regulation in the US

The deal is, after all, entirely voluntary, because Republican intransigence meant it could never be ratified by the Senate. Each country’s emissions targets are called “Nationally Determined Contributions” because they are nationally determined. There is no penalty for signatory countries

Trump’s withdrawal from Paris pact accomplishes nothing

Armed fighters of the UPC militia in the Central African Republic town of Bambari.

Trump’s view of the world, less competition for a finite supply of fossil fuels would help American businesses by restraining prices and aiding Trump’s “energy independence” goals.

And, as Secretary of State and former ExxonMo-bil CEO Rex Tillerson kept pointing out internally, we can’t promote the interests of US fossil fuel com-panies within the agreement’s future negotiations and implementation if we’re no longer part of it. So even from the vantage point of protecting the inter-ests of domestic fossil-fuel corporations, Trump’s action doesn’t make sense.

This decision amounts to arbitrarily siding with coal over other domestic energy sources. The pri-mary beneficiaries of moving away from coal to provide electricity are its competitors: natural gas, wind, solar and hydropower. All of those are abun-dantly available on US soil. The natural gas boom is benefiting oil and gas companies such as Exxon, which may be one reason that Tillerson favored staying in the agreement. Renewable energy sources produce far more jobs per kilowatt hour of electric-ity than coal, because the wind and sunshine are free to acquire but manufacturing and installing the technology to capture them is more labor-intensive than operating a few machines to conduct moun-taintop-removal mining. Solar and natural gas each employ more than twice as many Americans as coal. Energy efficiency programs, which are part of the Clean Power Plan that Trump’s Environmental Pro-tection Agency is scrapping and are on the chopping block in Trump’s budget, save money for US energy consumers — including the heavy manufacturing sector that Trump says he wants to revive.

Trump himself used to believe in what the Paris accord is doing, so Thursday’s announcement can’t be justified as a reflection of his deeply held convic-tions. In 2009, during the previous round of climate negotiations in Copenhagen, Trump signed a public letter to Obama endorsing a strong global climate agreement.

It makes sense only as a political statement: a middle finger to the scientific, environmental and international communities. It is a sop to his base voters, ideological elements of the GOP donor class and the right-wing media, for whom infuriating lib-erals and foreigners is its own reward. Unfortunately, the price for doing that is straining our relations with allies and unleashing catastrophic climate change.

The writer is a journalist in New York. He is a former

reporter for Grist, the Nation, Newsweek and Politico and

has written for the New York Times, the Atlantic, the

Guardian and the New Republic.

EDITOR-IN-CHIEF OFFICETEL: 4455 7741 / 767FAX: +974 4455 7758

MANAGING EDITORTEL: 4462 7505

DEPUTY MANAGING EDITORTEL: 4455 7769

LOCAL NEWS SECTION TEL: 4455 7743

BUSINESS NEWS SECTION TEL: 4462 7535

SPORT NEWS SECTION TEL: 4455 7745

ONLINE SECTION TEL: 4462 [email protected]

PUBLIC RELATIONSTEL: 4455 [email protected]

ADVERTISING DEPARTMENTTEL: 4455 7837 / 780FAX: 4455 7870 [email protected]

CLASSIFIED DEPARTMENTTEL: 4455 [email protected]

SUBSCRIPTION & DISTRIBUTIONTEL: 4455 7809 / 839FAX: [email protected]

D-RING ROADPOST BOX: 3488DOHA - [email protected]

All thoughts and views expressed in these columns are those of the writers, not of the newspaper.

All correspondence regarding Views and Opinion pages should be mailed to the [email protected]

many of the most serious crimes and priority areas for investigations.

The critical next step is ensur-ing that the court gets the full funding that it needs and becomes operational as soon as possible. This includes working to protect witnesses and to secure court personnel.

The government has taken important steps in recent months, including the appoint-ments of a chief prosecutor and other senior personnel, but it can do more to get the court up and running, such as appointing a point-person in the president’s office.

Governments have pledged only $5.2m of a needed $7m for the first 14 months of the court. Donors and the UN should back the court over the long term, including technical and logisti-cal support. And they should ensure that amnesty for grave crimes is not part of any peace deals negotiated by the UN or others.

Warlords and commanders need to be held accountable for the killings and people like Monica should know their lives, and the lives of their families, are worth something. The next report they see should be a progress report on justice.

The writer is a researcher in the

Africa Division at Human Rights

Watch focusing on the Central Afri-

can Republic since 2013.

Lewis MudgeAl Jazeera

Warlords and commanders need to be held accountable for the killings and people like Monica should know their lives, and the lives of their families, are worth something.

Ben AdlerThe Washington Post

Demonstrators protest President Donald Trump’s decision to exit the Paris climate change accord in Chicago, Illinois.

12 SUNDAY 4 JUNE 2017ASIA

Kashmiri residents pray inside the Sheikh Abdul Qadir Geelani shrine in downtown Srinagar, yesterday.

Ramadan prayers

New Delhi

Reuters

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and French President Emmanuel Macron said yesterday their countries would cooperate

in the fight against climate change, just days after the US withdrew from the Paris climate agreement.

Modi, whose country is the world’s third-biggest emissions generator, said in Russia on Fri-day that he would continue to back the deal and Macron has said the 2015 Paris agreement is irreversible despite US President Donald Trump’s decision to withdraw. “The protection of the environment and the mother planet is an article of faith,” Modi said at a joint news conference with Macron in Paris.

The two leaders, who met for the first time, announced no con-tracts or new initiatives.

“We are both convinced that our countries have to do a lot for the ecological and environmen-tal transition and the fight against global warming,” Macron

said, adding that France would go above and beyond its Paris agreement commitments.

He said he planned a visit to India before year-end for a first summit of the International Solar Alliance, an initiative launched by New Delhi and Paris during the Paris climate talks.

Macron said the alliance will lead to concrete measures in favour of solar energy and com-mit the companies of both

nations. The alliance seeks to mobilise more than a trillion dol-lars by 2030 and bring together well over 100 solar-rich coun-tries to deliver solar energy to some of the planet’s poorest.

The two leaders said they had also discussed how to com-bat terrorism and that they would work on concrete initia-tives before the end of the year to fight terrorism on the

Internet. Ties between the two countries have grown in recent years most notably in the defence sector with New Delhi ordering 36 French-made Rafale fighter jets.

India & France to jointly work on climate change

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi (right) says goodbye to French President Emmanuel Macron after a ceremony at the Arc de Triomphe in Paris on the last leg of his four-nation visit, yesterday.

New Delhi IANS

Maintaining that the Kash-mir issue cannot be solved in a "trice",

Home Minister Rajnath Singh said the government was ready for talks with whichever section of Kashmiris was prepared to engage with the Centre, includ-ing the youths, but parried questions on talks with separa-tist groups.

He said the central govern-ment wants a permanent solution to the Kashmir prob-lem by taking its people into confidence and is moving ahead in that direction.

"In democracy all the prob-lems can be solved through talks. We want to evolve a solu-tion through talks. Whoever wants to talk to us, we are com-pletely ready for it. If some organisations of youth would like to hold talks we are ready

for that. Kashmiri youths are the future of the nation," he said, addressing the media on three years of the Modi government.

"We want a permanent solu-tion to the Kashmir problem.

Honestly speaking, we want this permanent solution by taking Kashmiri people into confi-dence. It can't be resolved in a trice (chutki mein). It will require time," Singh said.

New Delhi

IANS

The CBI yesterday said it has busted a transfer racket at the Army

Headquarters here with the arrest of a Lt. Colonel and a middleman who took a bribe for the transfer of a Ben-galuru-based Army officer to a choice posting.

Lt. Col. Ranganathan Suvramani Moni, posted in the Personnel Department at the Army Headquarters, was arrested along with middle-men Gaurav Kohli from Moni's residence in the national capital on Friday fol-lowing a tip-off, an official said.

Separate CBI teams con-ducted raids on the premises of the accused and others at over 10 places in Delhi, Ben-galuru, Hyderabad, and Thiruvananthapuram and seized Rs 10 lakh and several incriminating documents.

The arrested persons were presented in a Special CBI court on Saturday, which sent them to four-day CBI custody. The agency said both were arrested when Kohli visited the Lt. Col.'s house to deliver him Rs 2 lakh, a part of the Rs 5 lakh bribe, for the transfer of Army officer S. Subhas.

"With their arrest, the CBI has busted a transfer racket in the Army Headquarters here that involved manipu-lation of Army postings in lieu of illegal gratification," the CBI official said.

Besides Moni and Kohli, the CBI has registered an FIR against a Secunderabad-based Army officer Purushottam, S. Subhas and other unnamed persons for criminal conspiracy under the Indian Penal Code and the Prevention of Corruption Act.

"The CBI has conveyed that the arrest is due to per-sonal improper practices of the officer. The CBI has indi-cated towards seeking of monetary gratification by the officer. The details are under investigation," Army sources said.

Govt ready for talks with Kashmiris

Srinagar

AA

Two soldiers were killed and four others wounded when sus-

pected militants ambushed an Indian army convoy in Jammu and Kashmir yesterday, according to a military source.

The attack took place in Qazigund area, about 70km from the capital, Srinagar, at around 11.15am when a mili-tary convoy was passing by a highway that connects the

disputed region with India. One of the injured soldiers

is in critical condition, the source who wished to stay anonymous due to restrictions on talking to the media, said; the injured soldiers were evacuated to a military hos-pital in Badamibagh, Srinagar.

The attack came a day after the Indian Army Chief, Gen. Bipin Rawat, met five of his top seven army generals in Srinagar during a two-day long meeting.

Two soldiers dead in ambush Srinagar

IANS

The NIA yesterday seized over `1 crore in cash, let-terheads of banned

terrorist organisations like LeT, and incriminating documents during two dozen raids con-ducted across Srinagar, Delhi, and Haryana in connection with terror funding by Pakistan-based groups to stoke unrest in Kashmir Valley.

The agency also registered a case against LeT founder Hafiz Saeed under the provi-sions of waging war against the country and criminal conspiracy.

NIA officials conducted raids in 14 places in Srinagar, including the houses of three separatist leaders -- Tehreek-e-Hurriyat leader Ghazi Javed Baba, Jammu and Kashmir Lib-eration Front leader Farooq

Ahmed Dar aka Bitta Karate, and suspended Hurriyat leader Nayeem Khan, and their aides.

In Delhi, raids were carried out in Ballimaran, Chandni Chowk, Rohini and Greater Kai-lash II areas, and at a cold storage in Haryana's Sonepat, a National Investigation Agency official said. Of the Rs 1.15 crore money seized, about Rs 65-70 lakh was recovered from Sri-nagar, and Rs 35-40 lakh in Delhi, the official said. The NIA also recovered property related documents, letterheads of banned terrorist organisations such as Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) and Hizbul Mujahideen (HM), pen drives, laptops and other incriminating documents from the premises of the accused. The official said the agency would conduct raids at fresh locations revealed during ques-tioning of the aides of the separatist leaders.

New Delhi IANS

Already dealing with the high particulate matters in the air, the national capi-

tal this summer has witnessed an alarming build-up of ozone, a Centre for Science and Envi-ronment (CSE) study said yesterday.

According to the CSE find-ings, on several occasions and several locations, between

February and May 2017, the ozone concentration was found to be very high —3.4 times the normal standard.

"Early deaths due to ozone pollution are the highest in India. The new burden of disease study by Health Effect Institute has shown that early deaths due to ozone have jumped by 148 per cent in India," it said.

Additional analysis also shows heat waves and sunshine have increased the frequency of

days with unhealthy levels of ozone.

Ozone, a more reactive form of oxygen, causes lung-related issues and heavy breathing. According to experts, its not directly emitted but is formed in a reaction between nitrogen oxides emitted from diesel vehi-cles and hydro-carbons in the presence of sunlight. Its stand-ards are based on hours -- the eight-hour standard concentra-tion is 100 units (microgramme

per cubic metre) and one-hour standard is 180 units.

"The share of days violating the eight-hour Cental Pollution Control Board (CPCB) standard of 100 microgram per cubic metre in February was 12 per cent -- this increased to 19 per cent in March, 52 per cent in April and finally a whopping 77 per cent in May," the CSE said, adding that the trend shows that the ozone pollution in the city was worsening progressively

with the onset of summer."Delhi and NCR are in the

grip of multi-pollutant crisis. Even before the health risk from particulate matter could be addressed, deadly ozone has raised its ugly head in Delhi and NCR. "Without a time-bound implementation strategy and preventive action, this can deepen into serious public health crisis. This will spare neither the rich nor the poor," said Anumita Roychowdhury, Executive

Director, Research and Advocacy and head of CSE's air pollution programme.

Diesel vehicles are one of the major sources of the nitrogen oxides (NOx) and thus indirectly the ozone. "Diesel vehicles pro-duce five times higher the NOx than the petrol vehicles... The BS-6 standard fuel, which would be launched in India in 2020, would drop this emission by 80 per cent," said Vivek Chatopad-hyay of the CSE.

NIA recovers LeT letterheads and `1 crore cash in raids

Ozone concentration at alarming levels in Delhi: CSE study

Patna

IANS

It was a sunny day and Raj Kumar Vaishya had trouble walking. But determined to

get a postgraduate degree, the 97-year-old sat for a three-hour MA exam, along with students y o u n g e r t h a n h i s grandchildren.

Vaishya, who graduated in 1938, was appearing for his final year MA (economics) examina-tion at Nalanda Open University (NOU), Patna. The exams began on Thursday and will continue till next week.

He wrote in English and used nearly two dozen sheets,

an NOU official said. "He sat for three hours like every other stu-dent, most of them younger than his grandchildren. It surprised us all, including other exami-nees," the official said.

Early this year, Vaishya was recognised by the Limca Book of Records as the oldest man to apply for a postgraduate degree.

A rare man, Raj Kumar Vaishya has set an example for millions of people who use age as an excuse to give up on their dreams. "I have decided to prove that even at 97 years, one can fulfil their dreams and achieve anything. I am an example," Vaishya said here.

Vaishya said: "I am also

trying to send a message to the youth that defeat should never be accepted. I want to tell them not to get upset and depressed. 'Mauka aur awsar har wakt rehta hai, kewal khud pe vish-was hona chahiyea' (There will be always be opportunities for those who believe in them-selves)," Vaishya said in mix of Hindi and Urdu.

He was frank in admitting that it is not easy to follow the routine of a student at his age. "It is really difficult for me to wake up early to prepare for the exams. My first exam was on June 1." Vaishya enrolled for the course in 2015. He said he has no plans to pursue a PhD.

97-year-old appears for MA exam

CBI busts Army postings racket; arrests official Promising visit

The alliance seeks to mobilise more than a trillion dollars by 2030 and bring together well over 100 solar-rich countries to deliver solar energy to some of the planet’s poorest.

The two leaders, who met for the first time, announced no contracts or new initiatives.

13SUNDAY 4 JUNE 2017 ASIA

Renowned guitarist Amir Zaki passes away Karachi

Internews

Renowned Pakistani gui-tarist Amir Zaki has died of heart failure,

leaving behind a legion of fans shocked at his untimely demise. He was 49. He was buried yesterday.

Zaki was one of the most inspiring musicians of the country. Many believe he was the best of his generation. He emerged on the showbiz scene in the 1980s when the face of popular music was changing in the country.

He played as a session musician for many bands, including Vital Signs and Fuzon, and music companies, but earned recognition through his masterful solo renditions.

His collaboration with artists such as Alamgir, Gumby and pop singer Had-iqaKiani in a band called Rough Cut did not garner enough accolades as far as the mainstream music buffs go, but was acknowledged in cir-cles that understand the finer points of the art form.

Although Zaki had acquired a bit of fame when he made a song titled ‘Money’ in a time period when a TV pro-gramme called Music Channel Charts was a rage among the younger audience,

Pakistan claims lynching 5 Indian soldiers

Marawi

AFP

Scores of people ran to free-dom through a terrifying gauntlet of military air

strikes and Islamist gunmen yes-terday, nearly two weeks after being trapped in a deadly battle for a Philippine city.

They included one of Marawi city's most respected politicians, who hid 71 Christians in his home and led 144 people through downtown streets held by self-styled Islamic State fighters and strewn with rotting corpses.

Norodin Alonto Lucman, the former vice governor of a Islam-ist self-ruled area that includes the now embattled city, said he twice turned away gunmen, some of them neighbours and distant relatives, at his Marawi home asking for food and weap-ons. But supplies eventually ran out and they fled through

bombed out downtown streets at the mercy of Islamist snipers.

"It's strewn with debris, dead bodies of chickens, rats, dogs,

even the smell of rotting flesh," he said of their two-kilometre route.

"As we walked many people saw us on the street and they

joined us," said Lucman.Twenty-three Christian

teachers and 15 other compan-ions also ran to safety yesterday from another area of Marawi, a

city of 200,000 and the Islamic capital of the mainly Catholic Philippines.

"We laid on the floor in the dark each night whenever we heard gunshots or explosions. We barricaded the doors with furniture and a refrigerator," high school teacher Jerona Sedrome, 27, said.

But after two attempts, the militants forced their way in and the teachers hid in a tunnel beneath the house, she added.

The rescued teachers recounted between tears and gulps of coffee and bottled water how they survived on steamed rice and rainwater over nearly two weeks of air strikes, fires, and gunfire that destroyed many of the surrounding houses.

"If it didn't rain we had no water and we didn't eat," said Sedrome's younger sister and fellow teacher, Jane Rose Sedrome, 25.

Scores flee Islamist gunmen in war-torn Marawi city

Philipine marines patrolling a deserted area on their way to assault an militants' hideout in Marawi city, yesterday.

Joint patrols off Mindanao to fight militantsSingapore

AFP

Malaysia, the Philippines and Indonesia will launch joint patrols in

waters off the Mindanao region this month to counter threats from Islamic State group mili-tants, Malaysia's defence minister said yesterday.

Hishammuddin Hussein made the comments at a secu-rity conference in Singapore as Philippine troops continued to battle self-styled Islamic State group gunmen who attacked the city of Marawi on Mindanao island nearly two weeks ago.

Hishammuddin said joint sea patrols in the waters bordering

the three nations would kick off on June 19, with air patrols start-ing at a later date.

Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte has declared martial law in Mindanao in response to the crisis, describing the attack on Marawi as the start of a major campaign by IS to establish a foothold in the Philippines.

Security analysts say IS is planning to establish a "province" in the southern island of Mind-anao as part of its efforts to set up a caliphate in Southeast Asia.

"If you talk about Sulu Straits (it) ... would involve Malaysia, Indonesia and the Philippines," Hishammuddin told delegates to Shangri-La Dialogue, an annual security summit.

"So within Asean, we decided at least these three countries, to avoid being accused of doing nothing, the three of us took the initiative to have the joint patrol... initiatives in the Sulu Straits," he added, referring to the Association of Southeast Asian Nations.

Hishammuddin said Malay-sia, Indonesia and Singapore have carried out successful joint patrols in the Malacca Strait bor-dering their countries to fight maritime piracy. Analysts have said the porous maritime bor-ders between the three countries make it hard to detect the move-ment of militants.

Mindanao is "the primary area in the region where

Islamist militant groups are still able to operate with some free-dom of operation, run training camps, and conduct frequent attacks," said Otso Iho, senior analyst at IHS Jane's Terrorism and Insurgency Centre (JTIC).

"This level of lawlessness and the fact that the space is dif-ficult for government forces and institutions to effectively govern makes it the most likely place for a declaration," he told AFP.

Hishammuddin and other defence ministers who spoke at the conference also warned of the threat posed by returning Southeast Asian militants who are fighting with the IS in Iraq and Syria where the group is los-ing territory.

Internet services to cost more in PunjabLahore

Internews

The government of Paki-stan’s Punjab province is aiming to increase pro-

vincial revenue receipts to Rs348.31bn in the next fiscal year 2017-18 by adding another service to the tax net.

Now, internet services have come under the tax net, which takes the total to 62 services on which the provincial govern-ment will collect general sales tax. However, internet services under student packages, whose cost does not exceed Rs1,500, have been exempted.

According to the provincial budget for fiscal year 2017-18 (FY18), which begins on July 1, the Punjab government is expected to collect Rs230bn in tax receipts and Rs117.32bn in non-tax revenues.

It has revised downwards the tax collection target to Rs175bn, which was earlier set at Rs184.43bn, for the ongoing fiscal year 2016-17. In a major move, the provincial govern-ment will float investment bonds worth Rs25bn in the next fiscal year and spend the income from its sale on various infrastructure projects.

The province is expected to

receive Rs1,502bn under gen-eral revenue receipts in FY18. From the divisible pool of taxes, it will get Rs1,154bn.

The provincial government has abolished the Capital Value Tax (CVT) and property regis-tration fee and merged both into the stamp duty in order to streamline the process for tax-payers, according to the Finance Bill tabled in the Pun-jab Assembly.

At present, 2 percent regis-tration fee is being charged on the value of urban property, Rs500 in case of property value up to Rs0.5m and Rs1,000 on the value exceeding Rs0.5m, which will be merged into the stamp duty. The new rate of stamp duty will be 5 percent.

However, the exemptions already envisaged in Section 6 of the Finance Act 2010 from the payment of CVT will remain intact. The definition of urban area has also been proposed to be included in the Stamp Act 1899. This step has been taken to promote ease of doing busi-ness in the province.

Recently, the Board of Rev-enue Punjab had introduced an e-stamping project for facili-tating the public and eliminating the use of counter-feit stamp papers.

Deadly explosions rock funeral in KabulKabul

AFP

At least 20 people were killed and dozens wounded as explo-sions rocked the funeral of an Afghan

politician's son who died during an anti-government protest over spiralling insecurity in Kabul, raising tensions in a city already on edge.

Witnesses reported three blasts at the burial site of Salim Ezadyar, who was among four people killed on Friday when the protest degenerated into street clashes with police, fuelling anger against the government.

The hilly, wind-swept site was littered with bloodied corpses and dismembered limbs, local television footage showed, with one witness telling AFP that "people were blown to pieces" due to the impact of the blasts.

"So far six dead bodies and 87 wounded people have been

brought to Kabul hospitals," health ministry spokesman Waheed Majroh told AFP.

The funeral of Salim Ezadyar, the son of an Afghan senator, was attended by senior government figures including Chief Executive Abdullah Abdullah, but his office told AFP that he was unhurt. No group has so far claimed respon-sibility for the attack. President Ashraf Ghani condemned the bombings, saying on Twitter: "The country is under attack. We must stay united."

The fresh killings are likely to further polarise a city that has been on edge since a truck bombing on Wednesday in Kabul's diplomatic quarter killed 90 people and wounded hun-dreds of others, in the deadliest attack on the Afghan capital since 2001.

The bombing highlighted the ability of militants to strike even in the capital's most secure dis-trict, home to the presidential palace and foreign embassies that are enveloped in a maze of concrete blast walls.

Hundreds of angry

demonstrators calling for Ghani to step down over spiralling inse-curity clashed with police on Friday, prompting officials to beat them back with live rounds in the air, tear gas and water cannon.

Kabul city was on lockdown yesterday with armed check-points and armoured vehicles patrolling the streets to prevent a repeat of Friday's protests.

Before the blasts at the

funeral, authorities had sealed off roads in the centre of the city, citing the threat of new attacks on large gatherings of people.

"We have intelligence reports that our enemies are trying again to carry out attacks on gather-ings and demonstrations," Kabul garrison commander Gul Nabi Ahmadzai said earlier yesterday. "We hope that people will stay away from protests."

But dozens of people still gathered yesterday under a tent close to the presidential palace calling for Ghani's government to resign, but the assembly was largely peaceful.

"Any government attempt to disrupt our fair and just demon-stration will show their complicity with terrorist groups and the perpetrators attack," said a spokesman for the protesters.

Karachi

Reuters

The Pakistani military said yesterday its troops had killed five Indian soldiers

in retaliation to Indian firing along the Line of Control in dis-puted Kashmir.

Pakistan on Friday accused Indian troops of shooting with-out provocation in Nezapir sector, wounding two civilians.

The Pakistani army spokes-man said yesterday that its troops had retaliated, killing five soldiers, wounding many, and destroying bunkers.

India denied that any of its soldiers had been killed or wounded in any cross-border attack.

“A woman was injured as Pakistani troops violated cease-fire twice in two sectors of Poonch district by firing mortar shells on forward posts and

civilian areas along the Line of Control, army to retaliate.” an Indian defence spokesman said.

Pakistani troops fired indis-criminately with small arms and mortars along the Line of Con-trol in Krishana Ghati sector, the spokesman said.

Tension over the Himalayan region has run high between the two nuclear-armed neighbors since a Pakistani military court sentenced an Indian accused of espionage to death.

Smoke rising from the site of a suicide attack after a blast in Kabul, yesterday.

Three blasts

Witnesses reported three blasts at the burial site of Salim Ezadyar, who was among four people killed on Friday when the protest degenerated into street clashes with police, fuelling anger against the government.

So far six dead bodies and 87 wounded people have been brought to Kabul hospitals," health ministry spokesman Waheed Majroh said.

14 SUNDAY 4 JUNE 2017ASIA

Visitors take photos in Tiananmen Square on the eve of the 28th anniversary of the crackdown on pro-democracy protests in Beijing yesterday. The Tiananmen pro-democracy movement ended in bloodshed on June 4, 1989 when tanks crushed the demonstrations, killing hundreds of protesters.

Tiananmen Square protests anniversary

Pentagon chief turns up heat on North KoreaSingapore

AFP

Pentagon chief Jim Mat-tis moved to reassure Asian allies yesterday that the United States can work with China

on reining in North Korea's nuclear weapons programme without compromising its oppo-sition to Beijing's continued "militarisation" of the South China Sea.

President Donald Trump —who frequently denounced China on the campaign trail — has turned to Beijing to help pres-sure Pyongyang, prompting broad concerns that America will go easy on China's maritime activities.

Longstanding partners are also mortified that Trump has seemed indifferent to traditional alliances, and have interpreted his pulling out of a trans-Pacific trade deal and the Paris climate accords as signs of broader American disengagement.

Mattis, arguably Trump's most important statesman as the new president hopes to slash the State Department, tried to allay the fears.

"In the security arena, we

have a deep and abiding com-mitment to reinforcing the rules-based international order, a product of so many nations' efforts to create stability," Mat-tis said in Singapore at the Shangri-La Dialogue, a major defence summit for countries from the Asia-Pacific region and beyond.

Calling North Korea's nuclear ambitions a "threat to us all," Mattis asked the international community to come together on the issue.

It is "imperative that we do our part each of us to fulfill our obligations and work together to support our shared goal of

denuclearisation on the Korean Peninsula," Mattis said.

"The Trump administration is encouraged by China's renewed commitment to work with the international commu-nity toward denuclearisation," he added.

Pyongyang on Monday test-fired another rocket, the latest in a series of launches and atomic tests that have ratcheted up tensions over its quest to develop weapons capable of hit-ting the United States — something Trump has said "won't happen".

The defence chief spoke directly to concerns America might grant concessions to China to ensure cooperation on North Korea, saying the issue was not "binary" and that the United States would continue to pres-sure Beijing elsewhere.

"Artificial island construction and indisputable militarisation of facilities on features in inter-national waters undermine regional stability," Mattis said, calling China out over its "disre-gard for international law" and "contempt for other nations' interests".

The US Navy on May 25 con-ducted a "freedom of navigation"

operation in the South China Sea, when the USS Dewey guided-missile destroyer sailed within 12 nautical miles of Mischief Reef in the Spratly Islands.

China claims nearly all of the South China Sea, despite partial counter-claims from Taiwan and several southeast Asian nations including the Philippines, Bru-nei, Malaysia and Vietnam.

It has rapidly built reefs into artificial islands capable of host-ing military planes and other

equipment. Summit delegates were clearly anguished by the South China Sea issue and Trump's intentions.

One questioner asked if the US president was an "unbeliever" in the rules-based regional order. Another wondered if he could be trusted given his "America First" pronouncements.

"Bear with us," Mattis said. "We will still be there, and we will be there with you."

Mattis was repeatedly asked

about Trump's decision to pull out of the Paris climate pact. He did not address the issue directly but the Pentagon generally views climate change as a security threat, especially given its role in famines and mass relocations.

Japanese Defence Minister Tomomi Inada later said she placed "full trust" in the United States, a sentiment echoed by Australian Defence Minister Marise Payne.

7 children drown in VietnamHanoi

QNA

Eight people, including seven children, died in two separate drowning

incidents in central Vietnam, state media reported yester-day. Van Tan Lanh, 68, took his two granddaughters and one of their friends to help wash the family's cattle in the Kut river in Binh Dinh prov-ince's Tay Son district on Friday morning, the Tuoi Tre newspaper reported.

When the cattle returned home unaccompanied, neigh-bours rushed to the river and found Lanh floating dead in the water along with his grandchildren Nguyen Thi Phuong Thanh, 14, and Nguyen Thi Tuyet Bang, 12, as well as 8-year-old Tran Anh Tuan.

Court frees daughter of South Korea's 'Rasputin'

UN expands sanctions against Pyongyang

Sri Lanka targets unauthorised builders after landslidesColombo

AFP

Sri Lanka announced plans yesterday to prosecute a slew of companies and

individuals behind illegal con-struction projects blamed for landslides and flooding that have killed at least 211 people follow-ing heavy monsoon rains last week.

The urban development ministry said they will press criminal charges against those illegally occupying marshlands earmarked to absorb flood waters and structures blocking canals and storm drains.

"Much of the destruction was due to people building on moun-tain slopes after cutting down trees and blocking waterways," a ministry spokesman said.

Prosecutors will kick off pro-ceedings Monday in Colombo against 18 individuals and com-panies, he said, as authorities prepare to launch a nationwide campaign to remove illegal structures.

There are some 10,000 unauthorised structures in the

capital alone, according to the spokesman.

Decades of illegal construc-tion have worsened the flooding by blocking drains and eliminat-ing natural rainwater stores, including marshland.

The official Disaster Man-agement Centre (DMC) said the death toll from last week's rains that triggered landslides and flooding rose to 211 after more bodies were discovered under tonnes of mud.

Among those killed were 45 school children. Over 90 people were still listed as missing while another 72 remained in hospi-tal. Nearly 2,000 homes were destroyed and over 10,000 suf-fered structural damage reported the DMC.

The centre said the situation across the country had improved but thousands of security per-sonnel were still assisting in relief and recovery operations.

The flooding is the worst since May 2003 when 250 peo-ple were killed and 10,000 homes destroyed after a simi-larly powerful monsoon, officials said. Monsoon rains last year

also caused flooding and land-slides, killing more than 100 people. Government spokesman Rajitha Senaratne said additional medical teams were also being deployed to prevent the spread of waterborne diseases.

Foreign Minister Ravi Karu-nanayake said 16 countries had rushed relief supplies and

medicine to assist those driven from their homes following Fri-day's monsoon deluge.

"We also have a lot of enquiries from other countries and organisations wanting to know our immediate needs. We are moved by the spontaneous response," Karunanayake told reporters.

Japan's Defence Minister Tomomi Inada, US Secretary of Defence James Mattis and Australia's Defence Minister Marise Payne before a trilateral meeting on the sidelines of the 16th IISS Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore, yesterday.

Sri Lankan residents clear debris from damaged homes following flooding in Yatagampitiya village in Bulathsinhala, yesterday.

Mattis reassures allies

President Donald Trump —who frequently denounced China on the campaign trail — has turned to Beijing to help pressure Pyongyang, prompting broad concerns that America will go easy on China's maritime activities.

Seoul

AFP

The daughter of South Korea's "Rasputin", whose lavish lifestyle in Europe

saw her caught up in the coun-t r y ' s s n o w b a l l i n g influence-peddling scandal, was freed yesterday after being extradited from Denmark. Chung Yoo-Ra is the equestrian daughter of Choi Soon-Sil, the close confidante of impeached ex-president Park Geun-Hye and the woman at the heart of the scandal which toppled Park.

Choi— dubbed "the female Rasputin" for her strong influ-ence over Park -- is on trial along with the ex-president.

Chung was arrested on a Korean Air flight from Amster-dam early Wednesday and was escorted off the plane at Incheon by a team of prosecu-tors to face a handful of

journalists and television cam-eras. Prosecutors say cash for Chung's equestrian training came from electronics giant Samsung, which had handed over the money as part of an attempt to curry favour with her powerful mother.

However, a Seoul court ordered her released yesterday. "It is difficult to accept the rea-son and the need for her arrest", the Seoul Central District Court said, turning down the prose-cution's request to formally arrest the 21-year-old.

The court noted basic evi-dence had already been secured by prosecutors and she was not an active part in the case. Fol-lowing the decision, Chung, who had been in custody since being extradited from Denmark Wednesday, said: "I'm truly sorry for having caused so much concern to many. ... I will sin-cerely reply to prosecutors."

United Nations AFP

The UN Security Council has expanded sanctions against North Korea in

response to a series of missile tests conducted by Pyongyang this year. The measures imposed a travel ban and asset freeze on four entities and 14 officials, including the head of North Korea's overseas spying operations.

The Council voted unani-mously on Friday to back the sanctions after weeks of nego-tiations between the US and China, CNN reported.

The new asset and travel freeze targeted senior officials and its core military apparatus that were directly responsible for the regime's illicit nuclear and ballistic missile pro-grammes, South Korea Ambassador to the UN, Cho Tae-Yul, told the council.

The list of expanded sanc-tions also included state officials and banks.

North Korea's strategic rocket force, the Koryo Bank and two trading firms were also added to the list.

The Koryo Bank was linked to a party office that managed the finances of North Korea's top officials, including leader Kim Jong-un.

Though US military exer-cises in the Korean peninsula had been controversial in the international community, US Ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley urged Security Council members to enforce the new sanctions.

"The Security Council is sending a clear message to North Korea today -- stop fir-ing ballistic missiles or face the consequences," Haley said after the vote.

"Countries must also do more to break up North Korean smuggling rings, and cut off the sources of funding North Korea uses to pay for the development of weapons of mass destruction and the means to deliver them," she said in a statement.

15SUNDAY 4 JUNE 2017 EUROPE

Britain's Queen Elizabeth during the Derby Festival, yesterday. Wings of Eagles rallied to win the English Derby at 40-1 odds, giving trainer Aidan O'Brien his sixth victory in the race.

Royal visit

London

Reuters

British Prime Minister Theresa May is on course to win Thurs-day’s election by a much smaller margin

than previously predicted, opin-ion polls showed yesterday, as her campaign stumbled again, this time over taxation for the wealthy.

In a sign of how far her snap election gamble has soured, May’s personal rating turned negative for the first time in a poll conducted by research firm Comres since she won the top job in the turmoil following the June 23 Brexit referendum.

Comres found the Conserv-ative Party’s lead stood at 12 percentage points, unchanged from a week ago but far below the 21-point lead it recorded just before she called the election on April 18.

An Opinium poll for the Observer newspaper suggested May was set for a substantial par-liamentary majority on June 8, though her lead over the oppo-sition Labour Party has fallen to six percentage points from 19 points at the start of the campaign.

Just five days before polls open, May’s campaign sent con-flicting messages on taxation for

top earners, an issue which the Conservatives are sensitive about because the opposition Labour Party casts them as the party of the rich and privileged.

May insisted nothing had changed on her tax policy - she has kept open the possibility of tax rises - after her defence min-ister, Michael Fallon, was quoted by a national newspaper as say-ing that income tax would not increase for higher earners.

“Our position on tax hasn’t changed,” May said while on a visit to West Yorkshire in north-ern England.

“What people will know when they go to vote on Thurs-day is that it is the Conservative Party that always has been and is and always will be a low-tax party,” she said.

Her comments were echoed by her finance minister, Philip Hammond, though May has stoked speculation about Ham-mond’s future by refusing to say whether she will reappoint him if she wins the election.

Labour leader Jeremy Cor-byn, a radical socialist who has run an unexpectedly strong cam-paign, said the Conservative leadership was in disarray.

“There’s complete chaos going on at the top of the gov-ernment,” Corbyn told reporters.

When May stunned financial markets and political opponents by calling the snap election, her poll ratings indicated she could be on course to win a landslide majority on a par with the 1983 majority of 144 won by Marga-ret Thatcher.

But since then, May’s lead has been eaten away to as little as 3 percentage points, according to opinion polls, meaning she might no longer score the thumping victory she had hoped for ahead of this month’s launch of formal Brexit negotiations.

If she fails to handsomely beat the 12-seat majority her

predecessor David Cameron won in 2015, her electoral gamble will have failed and her authority will be undermined both inside the Conservative Party and at talks with 27 other EU leaders.

The decline in support for the Conservatives coincided with a surprise announcement by May last month that she would make elderly people pay more for their social care, despite concerns that it could undermine support among ageing, wealthy home-owners - a core source of Conservative votes.

May later softened the pro-posal by saying there would be a limit on the amount people would have to pay.

The Comres polling firm found May’s personal net approval rating had fallen to minus 3, down 12 points from a positive 9 point approval rating in February. Corbyn’s net per-sonal rating was minus 15, up 18 points from a minus 33 score in February.

The latest confusion over income tax underscores the chal-lenge facing the next government to meet the growing costs of pub-lic services at a time when Britain’s budget deficit remains large, and with Brexit-related uncertainty likely to weigh on the economy.

When May unveiled her elec-tion policies last month, she left

open the possibility of higher income taxes by promising only that there would be no rises in value-added tax and dropping a Conservative pledge under Cam-eron - made in the 2015 election campaign - not to raise income tax, national insurance contri-butions or VAT.

The constraints of that pledge became clear earlier this year when May’s government tried to increase national insurance con-tributions on self-employed

workers. It was then forced into a U-turn after Conservative law-makers, wary of alienating small businesspeople, protested that it broke the 2015 pledge.

Labour said Fallon’s com-ments showed the Conservatives were protecting higher earners at the expense of the less well-off. “The mask has finally slipped,” John McDonnell, a law-maker who would be finance minister if Labour win the elec-tion, said in a statement.

May sees fall in lead in run up to UK pollsTaxation row

Comres found the Conservative Party’s lead stood at 12 percentage points, unchanged from a week ago but far below the 21-point lead it recorded just before she called the election on April 18.

May insisted nothing had changed on her tax policy after her defence minister said that income tax would not increase for higher earners.

Britain's Prime Minister Theresa May speaks during an election campaign visit to Horsfields Nursery in Silkstone, South Yorkshire, yesterday.

Berlin

AFP

Germany's biggest rock fes-tival will resume after being disrupted by fears

of a possible "terrorist threat" which have proved to be unfounded, the organisers said yesterday.

Police said searches at the three-day "Rock am Ring," held near the southwestern city of Koblenz were over. Live music will resume at 1:30pm.

Some 90,000 people are expected to attend the event which ends today.

"After a series of intensive searches across the site the fears of an imminent danger were not confirmed," the organisers said.

"The police gave the go-ahead" for the festival to restart, they said.

The festival was evacuated on Friday evening after Koblenz police said they were in posses-sion of "concrete elements, in the light of which a possible terror-ist threat cannot be ruled out".

Police said three people sus-pected of being members of a Salafist group in the neighbour-ing state of Hesse were detained but released yesterday.

"One person who is not of German origin and is known to the police as having links to the Islamist terror network had access to" backstage areas, police spokesman Wolfgang Fromm said. The three had been hired to set up security barriers at the venue.

Security for the festival had already been stepped up, with an additional 1,200 staff, in response to the May 22 Manches-ter bombing which occurred after a concert by US singer Ari-ana Grande.

The region's interior minis-ter Roger Lewentz defended the decision to evacuate the festival, saying: "We cannot take risks."

Last year's Rock am Ring programme was curtailed by violent storms in which dozens of people were injured by lightning.

The country remains on high

alert after a jihadist attack on a Christmas market in Berlin on December 19. Anis Amri, a

24-year-old Tunisian, hijacked a truck, killed its Polish driver and ploughed the vehicle

through the market, claiming 11 more lives and wounding dozens.

German rock festival to resume after terror scare

Rome

AP

Police in southern Italy are under fire for allow-ing one of Italy's

most-wanted mob bosses to greet his fans after his arrest and let them kiss his hand.

Police arrested Giuseppe Giorgi early Friday in a bun-ker inside his home in San Luca, the base of some of the most notorious clans of the Calabrian 'Ndrangheta mob.

A video shown on Sky TG24 showed police jumping for joy after the arrest. But another showed them letting an un-cuffed Giorgi greet well-wishers outside his home as they escorted him out. One reached out for Gior-gi's hand and kissed it to show respect.

Italian magistrate Feder-ico Cafiero de Raho says police couldn't have foreseen the gesture and insisted the arrest was a sign of police strength even amid such "tribal rites."

Festival goers hold up signs that read "Terror is not good" and "No terror for nobody" as they cheer for a rock band at the open-air weekend "Rock am Ring" concert at Germany's Formula One race track Nuerburgring, Germany, yesterday.

Paris

AFP

Fr e n c h P r e s i d e n t Emmanuel Macron yes-terday again urged Turkey

to release a French photojour-nalist held for nearly a month, saying he should be freed urgently.

In a phone call with Turk-ish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Macron "restated his call to see (Mathias) Depardon brought home as soon as pos-sible", Macron's Elysee Palace office said.

Depardon was detained on May 8 while on assignment in Hasankeyf in the southeast-ern Batman province for National Geographic maga-zine. He has been held ever since despite reports he would be deported.

Two weeks after he was detained, Depardon, 36, went on hunger strike, only stopping

nearly a week later when he learned a consular visit would be allowed.

He was later visited by a French consul representative at an immigration department-run centre in the southeastern city of Gaziantep.

The visit followed Macron broaching his case with Erdogan during a NATO sum-mit in Brussels on May 25. Erdogan promised he would "rapidly" look into the issue.

Another visit by French embassy representatives had been scheduled for Friday, the same day that the French for-eign ministry said it was "actively working" on Depar-don's release.

Depardon was detained over "propaganda for a terror group" -- a reference to out-lawed Kurdish militants -- which could lead to a judi-cial investigation, according to Turkish authorities.

Macron presses Turkey to free French photojournalist

Italy police under fire for letting mob boss greet fans

Rome

AP

Italian news reports say police are looking for the thieves who stole relics of

St. John Bosco, founder of the Salesian religious order, from a basilica east of Turin.

The ANSA news agency quoted Turin Archbishop Cesare Nosiglia as appealing to the bandits to "return it immediately, without condi-tion." The reliquary was apparently stolen Friday night from the basilica of Castel-nuovo Don Bosco, so named for the town's most famous son. Don Bosco was a 19th century priest and educator whose name graces Salesian-run schools around the globe. Relic thefts are not uncom-mon in Italian churches and shrines.

Relics of St John Bosco stolen from Italy church

16 SUNDAY 4 JUNE 2017EUROPE

A new Russian Arctic LNG tanker, Christophe de Margerie, is seen moored during its naming ceremony in St. Petersburg, Russia, yesterday.

Christening of the ship

Valletta

AFP

Maltese voters flocked to the polls yesterday in an election seen as a confidence vote

in Joseph Muscat's government, which has presided over a thriv-ing economy but been rocked by serious corruption allegations.

Voting was brisk even by the standards of an island nation where more than 90 percent of the electorate generally turns out to vote.

Pre-election polls pointed to 43-year-old Muscat's Labour Party (PL) retaining power but a high number of undecideds meant a surprise could not be ruled out.

A result is expected around midday today in an election bat-tled dominated by the fallout from the so-called Panama Papers, data leaked from Pana-manian law firm Mossack Fonseca about offshore compa-nies and bank accounts set up by wealthy individuals all over the world.

Simon Busuttil, leader of the opposition Nationalist Party (PN), has framed the vote as a choice between change and allowing Malta's international reputation, and its prosperity, to be shred-

ded by a series of scandals."We were promised the best

in the EU, instead we got Pan-ama in the EU," Busuttil supporter Angele Pulis said after voting yesterday.

Muscat went to the polls a year early after his wife Michelle Muscat was accused of being the beneficial owner of a secret Pan-amanian shell company used to bank unexplained payments from Azerbaijan's ruling family.

The premier's chief of staff and a government minister have separately admitted having their own, previously undeclared

offshore companies after being exposed by the Panama Papers.

Muscat came under fire for not firing the two men and the allegations against his inner cir-cle have since broadened to include more detailed claims of kickbacks linked to an invest-ment-based citizenship scheme, a gas supply deal with China and the granting of bank licences.

Muscat and his wife appeared relaxed as they cast their votes. Before announcing the election he asked a magis-trate to look into the allegations against her and vowed to quit if any evidence of wrongdoing emerged.

"It would have been the eas-iest thing in the world for me to weather the storm on the seat of power, while waiting for the magisterial inquiry to clear my name before calling an election," he said earlier in the campaign.

"However, in those few months the economy would have been damaged and jobs would have been lost."

Ballot stations close at 10pm (2000 GMT). An antiquated man-ual vote-counting system, being used for the last time, means no reliable indicator of the result will be available before midday on Sunday.

Many Maltese have lifelong allegiances to one of the two

main parties, which experts say partly explains why Muscat appears to have been unscathed by the deluge of charges against people close to him.

"I have been Labour since I was born, and I will be Labour till I die," said Muscat supporter Frank Abela, who is about to retire after a career in the oil industry.

But he said Labour loyalists were not indifferent to the cor-ruption claims -- they just want to see proof.

"An allegation is one thing,

an investigation is another thing and being found guilty or inno-cent is the final verdict. I'm 100 percent convinced he (Muscat) is clean. Regarding the other people, we will find out in due course."

Charlene Zammit said she had voted for Muscat because "Malta has one of the lowest unemployment rates in Europe and I want to keep it on the right track in the next five years."

But pensioner Louis Attard said Malta's economic success -- it is growing three times faster

than the eurozone as a whole -- predated Muscat.

"He is doing well with what he found. It's not on his merit," Attard said.

Postgrad student Marie Claire Finger said the premier should have sidelined any offi-cials with the shadow of corruption hanging over them.

"Personally I think that it is embarrassing... to say I come from a country going through these things at the moment," she told AFP. "I hope there will be a change."

Malta decides future in bitter election battle

Prime Minister and Labour Party leader, Joseph Muscat, casts his vote during Malta's snap general elections at his home town of Burmarrad in Malta, yesterday.

Results today

Voting was brisk even by the standards of an island nation where more than 90 percent of the electorate generally turns out to vote.

A result is expected around midday today in an election battled dominated by the fallout from the so-called Panama Papers.

Madrid

AFP

Spanish coast guards res-cued more than 170 migrants crossing the Med-

iterranean to Europe from northern Africa in four separate boats, they said yesterday.

Morocco notified Spain's coast guards that a boat had been spotted trying to cross the Alboran Sea, the westernmost portion of the Mediterranean that ends with the Strait of

Gibraltar before connecting with the Atlantic Ocean.

As rescuers set off, they were told that three other boats carrying migrants had also been seen in the same area.

One of them was spotted by a plane helping EU border agency Frontex with surveil-lance, the other by a ferry, and the third by people on a Span-ish naval base on Alboran Island, which lies between Morocco and Spain.

In all, 173 migrants from

sub-Saharan Africa were res-cued and taken by ship to the Spanish ports of Almeria and Motril, a coast guard spokesman said.

According to the Interna-tional Organization for Migration, 2,426 migrants arrived in Spain by sea between January 1 and the end of April.

This still represents a small percentage of the more than 45,000 who crossed the Medi-terranean to Italy, Greece, Spain and Cyprus over the period.

Paris

AFP

In an unusual move, France's foreign ministry issued a pointed fact-check of Donald

Trump's claims about the UN's Paris climate agreement.

The ministry issued a tweet with an embedded link to a video that amounted to a wry but very public rebuttal of Trump's assertions.

On Thursday, the White House had tweeted, "The Paris Accord is a bad deal for Ameri-cans," and linked to a video

which said the agreement "undermines" US competitive-ness and jobs, was "badly negotiated" by former president Barack Obama and "accom-plishes little."

In its response (https://tiny-url.com/y9vs8775), the foreign ministry tweeted, "We've seen the @WhiteHouse video about the #ParisAccord. We disagree -- so we've changed it."

Its own video uses the same format -- background, font, images and music -- as the White House version but adds facts to debunk the White House claims.

It refers, for example, to major companies such as Exx-onmobil and Microsoft which "disagree" that the accord will "undermine" US jobs, and quotes the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) on the urgent need to fight carbon emissions.

The tweet includes a now-popular hashtag "make our planet great again" -- a cheeky adaptation of the nationalist slo-gan used by Trump on his election campaign trail.

The video is also notable for being in English. France is famous for championing the use

of the French language, and its leaders are always under pres-sure to speak only in French, even if they are fluent in English, when they are in the public arena.

But newly-elected president Emmanuel Macron, a 39-year-old former banker, has made a point of speaking in English, apparently seeking to make direct contact with a wider audience.

On Thursday, he released a video in English as well as French in which he criticised Trump for pulling out of the Paris

accord and coined the "Make our planet great again" slogan.

He also invited American sci-entists, businesspeople and citizens who are frustrated by the White House's stance to "come and work here with us" on find-ing a solution to the climate crisis.

"They will find in France a second homeland," Macron said. His remarks were retweeted more than 140,000 times and "liked" by more than a quarter of a million users, according to Twitter figures as of Friday afternoon.

Vienna

AFP

An Austrian court sen-tenced to up to 10 years in jail two couples who

took their children to live in an IS-controlled part of Syria and showed them execution videos.

The two men and their wives travelled to Syria with their eight children -- the youngest of whom was two years old -- in December 2014, the trial in the southern city Graz heard.

Housed by the Islamic State extremist group, the children had to watch the gruesome vid-eos for initiation and one seven-year-old boy was even present at a beheading.

Defendant Hasan O., 49, denied in court being a mem-ber of IS and said that he worked as a masseur treating injured fighters.

"I heard in the mosque (in Graz) that you can live accord-ing to Islam there, with freedom for the women and children," he told the trial. He just wanted to spend "10 or 12 days" there,

he said. The dream soon went sour, however, and the families fled Syria in April 2016. Turkey then extradited them to Austria and the children were taken into care.

All four -- Hasan O. and his wife Kata O., Enes S. and his wife Michaela S. -- were con-victed of belonging to a terrorist organisation and of mistreat-ing and neglecting children.

They were sentenced to 10 years behind bars except Kata O. who was given nine years. All except Austrian-born Mus-lim convert Michaela S. were from Bosnia but all had Aus-trian citizenship.

The judge said that the sen-tences were intended to show "that the state of Austria won't accept something like this".

Austria has so far been spared the spate of Islamist extremist attacks suffered in recent years by other European countries. However some 300 people from the 8.7-million-strong nation have travelled to Syria since the civil war there began, one of the highest num-bers per capita in the European Union.

London

AFP

An ex-wife of Charles Taylor, the former Liberian leader who is

in jail for war crimes, was charged in Britain with tor-ture over her alleged involvement in his rebellion, police said.

Agnes Reeves Taylor, who lives in Dagenham in east London, faces four allegations dating back to December 1989, when forces loyal to her former husband launched their first attack on Liberian territory.

The 51-year-old is in cus-tody and will appear in court in London, according to a statement from the capital's Metropolitan Police.

Two charges relate to claims that between Decem-ber 23, 1989, and January 1, 1991, Taylor "intentionally inflicted severe pain or suf-fering on an individual in the performance or purported performance of her official duties" in the central Liberian city of Gbarnga.

Gbarnga was the base of Taylor's rebellion against President Samuel Doe, which deteriorated into one of Afri-ca's bloodiest conflicts.

Another count relates to the same period and the same allegation, but this time in Gborplay, on the border with Ivory Coast.

The fourth count claims that between the same period, Taylor "agreed with others" on a course of action that "would necessarily amount to or involve the commission of the offence of torture".

Charles Taylor, once Liberia's most feared rebel fighter who served as presi-dent from 1997 to 2003, is serving a 50-year sentence in a British jail for his role in fuelling the civil conflict in neighbouring Sierra Leone.

Geneva-based organisa-tion Civitas Maxima said the charging of Agnes Reeves Taylor was highly significant.

Austrian court jails parents who took kids to live under IS

France 'corrects' White House video on climate pact facts

Spain rescues 173 migrants in a day

Charles Taylor's ex-wife charged with torture

17SUNDAY 4 JUNE 2017 AMERICAS

Government officials tour an area flooded by the rains of Tropical Storm Beatriz in Juchitan, in Oaxaca state, Mexico.

Washington

AP

President Donald Trump is launching a major push for a $1 trillion overhaul of the nation's roads and

bridges, a key item on his agenda that's been stymied in Congress and overshadowed by White House controversies.

Trump plans a series of events this coming week to high-light his effort to modernize American infrastructure — the highway, waterway, electrical and airway systems on which the nation operates. His campaign for public and private funding for the projects is expected to run from the Rose Garden, where he'll speak about upgrading air traffic control, to Ohio and Ken-tucky on inland waterways and through meetings with mayors, governors and Transportation Department officials.

The Trump administration has struggled to gain traction on many of its economic policies. Job growth has slowed in recent months instead of accelerating as the president predicted.

Trump has said he has tax legis-lation moving through Congress but his effort has been stalled and no bill has been written. His budget plan released during his foreign trip included math errors that enabled the White House to falsely claim that its tax plan would deliver both faster growth and a balanced budget.

Trump's agenda has been overshadowed by ongoing probes into whether Trump campaign officials or associates colluded with Russian officials to influence the 2016 election, as well as scru-tiny over Trump's firing of FBI

Director James Comey — who is scheduled to testify on Capitol Hill on Thursday.

And other policies on the agenda, such as health care and taxes, come first on a fast-clos-ing legislative calendar.

But modernising the nation's infrastructure remains a challenge with broad public support.

Trump's push to revamp deteriorating roads, bridges, air-ports and railways aims to unlock economic growth and succeed in an area where his predecessor, former President Barack Obama, was repeatedly thwarted by a Republican-led Congress. "It doesn't matter who you are, whether you are farmer in the Midwest, or a mother driv-ing your kids to and from school, or a worker or a college kid fly-ing back and forth to school, you're affected by infrastruc-ture," said White House economic adviser Gary Cohn in a conference call with reporters.

Cohn said the nation was "fall-ing behind and the falling behind is affecting economic growth in the United States. The president wants to fix the problems and he

doesn't want to push these liabil-ities into the future."

Trump on Monday is set to outline his legislative principles for overhauling the air traffic control system, using a Rose Gar-den address to propose

separating air traffic control operations from the Federal Avi-ation Administration, a key priority for US airlines.

The president plans to travel to Ohio and Kentucky on Wednesday to address ways of

improving levies, dams and locks along inland waterways that are crucial to agricultural exports. His visit is expected to include a speech expected to touch on partnering with states and local governments.

Trump to push for overhauling infrastructureModernisation

Trump plans a series of events this coming week to highlight his effort to modernise American infrastructure.

Trump is set to outline his legislative principles for overhauling air traffic system.

Supporters of Donald Trump and his policies demonstrate during a "Pittsburgh Not Paris" rally in support of his decision to withdraw the US from the Paris Climate Accord, in Lafayette Square, next to the White House, in Washington, DC, yesterday.

Farmers decry plans to cut agriculture subsidiesTrump 'may not block' Comey's testimonyWashington

Reuters

US President Donald Trump does not plan to invoke executive privi-

lege as a way to block former FBI Director James Comey from testifying to Congress next week, the New York Times said citing two unnamed senior administration officials.

Yesterday, a White House spokesperson referred a ques-tion about the Times' story to outside council. Outside coun-cil did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Comey was leading a Fed-eral Bureau of Investigation probe into alleged Russian med-dling in last year's US presidential election and possible collusion by Trump's campaign when the president fired him last month. On Friday, White House officials

said that they did not know yet whether President Donald Trump would seek to block Comey's testimony, a move that could spark a political backlash. "I have not spoken to counsel yet. I don't know how they're going to respond," White House spokesman Sean Spicer told reporters on Friday.

The former FBI chief is due to testify on Thursday before the Senate Intelligence Committee as part of its own Russia-related investigation, and his remarks could cause problems for the Republican president.

Presidents can assert execu-tive privilege to prevent government employees from sharing information. However, legal experts say it is not clear whether certain conversations between Trump and Comey that the president has talked about publicly would be covered.

Iowa

AP

Farm groups and some members of Congress from farm states are decrying

proposed cuts to crop insurance and other safety net programs for farmers included in President Donald Trump's budget.

The proposed cuts come even as farmers are facing their fourth straight year of falling income, and could particularly affect farm states such as Iowa, Kansas and Nebraska that helped Trump win the Novem-ber election.

"Clearly, this budget fails agriculture and rural America," American Farm Bureau Feder-ation President Zippy Duvall said in a statement.

The proposed budget would cap the amount of money the US government provides to help farmers pay insurance premi-ums and eliminate insurance coverage for lost revenue when crop prices and per-acre yields fall. That would reduce the fed-eral insurance program's budget by $28bn over 10 years.

Trump has also proposed reducing subsidies to farmers, cutting those programs by $9 bil-lion by decreasing the maximum income level from $900,000 to $500,000 for a farmer to be eli-gible. The budget would also cut 5,263 jobs at the US Department of Agriculture, a 5.5 percent reduction in staff.

Farmers, economists and agriculture experts say it is impor-tant to support the agriculture

sector, which makes up about 11 percent of US employment, or about 21 million jobs, and contrib-utes nearly $1 trillion to the nation's domestic productivity.

"The strength of the agricul-tural economy has implications for rural America, but also for the larger U.S. economy," Robert Johansson, the USDA's chief econ-omist, told senators last month.

Michigan Sen. Debbie Stabe-now, the leading Democrat on the Senate Agriculture Commit-tee, warned that the proposed cuts "would have a dispropor-tionate impact on small towns across our country and leave those communities in crisis."

But some people say there's no need for farmers to worry just yet. "What I've been telling farm-ers is let's just relax a bit before

we panic. It's going to be hard for Trump to get anything done. That's become really obvious," said Brent Gloy, a former Pur-due University agriculture economist who now works full-time on his family's corn, soybean and wheat farm in southwest Nebraska, where Trump had strong support.

Indeed, Republican US Sen. Charles Grassley, who owns a farm in Iowa and is a member of the agriculture and budget com-mittees, doesn't expect the crop insurance cuts to make it through Congress. Grassley considers Trump's budget a non-starter, much like the budget proposals of Presidents George W Bush and Barack Obama, who also sug-gested farm program cuts that never materialized.

AA aircraft veers off Texas runway; stuck in mudSan Antonio

AP

An American Airlines plane veered off of a runway at the San

Antonio airport during take-off on Saturday morning and got stuck in the mud, author-ities said.

No injuries were reported on American Airlines Flight 2214, said Federal Aviation Administration spokesman Lynn Lunsford. Commercial flights at San Antonio Inter-national Airport were suspended until the aircraft could be removed.

Thirty-eight passengers and six crew members were bused back to the terminal.

The Boeing 737 bound for Dallas-Fort Worth Interna-tional Airport aborted takeoff for undetermined reasons and veered off the runway at a low speed, Coello said. The flight had originally left Albu-querque, New Mexico, on Friday for Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport, she said. But she says the flight was diverted to San Antonio Friday because of storms in the Dallas area.

Lunsford says FAA inves-tigators are on their way to the site and the National Transportation Safety Board has been notified.

Judge briefly bars Muslim kids' visit to courtroomNew York

AP

Some Islamic school students in New York City got a sur-prise civics lesson when a

judge briefly barred them from a public courtroom, saying she sus-pected their presence was a ploy to get sympathy with the jury.

The unusual move came Wednesday at a federal court-house in Manhattan on the second day of a civil trial in which the US

government is trying to seize a skyscraper it claims is secretly owned by Iran. An Iranian-Amer-ican charity, the Alavi Foundation, owns 60 percent of the Fifth Ave-nue office tower and is fighting the US government's attempt.

US District Judge Katherine Forrest halted testimony when 16 students in uniforms and head coverings arrived on a field trip from the Razi School, a private school in Queens that is sup-ported by the charity.

The judge said she thought the students' presence was "games-manship" and she barred them from entering while she spoke with lawyers. She ultimately let the children in, just in time for them to hear a lawyer ask if the white scarves worn by 10 students were to blame for the snub. His comments angered the judge, who called them "so inappropriate that it is breathtaking."

Afterward, Sayyed Musawi, one of two social studies

teachers who chaperoned the students, said, "The judge is out of line here." Musawi said he had urged the school to permit the field trip before exams started later in the week and the pur-pose of the trip was to learn about the legal system, not to build jury sympathy for the Alavi Foundation.

"The lawyer didn't even know me or any of the students," he told The Associated Press in an interview on Friday.

Forrest had already admon-ished the charity's lawyer once for saying during his opening arguments that the US govern-ment wants to impose the "death penalty" on the foundation. She labeled it "gamesmanship" that students from the school arrived the next day. The judge said she would let testimony resume if the lawyers "are content to send these folks away," and view the proceedings on a TV feed in another part of the building.

Los Angeles

AFP

A homeless man was arrested on Friday on sus-picion of stealing the

wedding ring and backpack of one of two men fatally stabbed on a commuter train in Oregon last week. George Tschaggeny, 51, was wearing the wedding band of army veteran Ricky Best when he was arrested under an overpass in Portland, police spokesman Pete Simpson said.

He said detectives had also

recovered Best's backpack, which had also been stolen, but his wallet was missing.

Best, 53, and Taliesin Myrd-din Namkai-Meche, 23, were fatally stabbed on May 26 as they intervened to stop a man hurling racial and anti-Muslim slurs at two teenage girls, one of whom was wearing the hijab.

Another man on board the commuter train who intervened was also stabbed but survived. Jeremy Joseph Christian, 35, was arrested and charged in the stabbings.

Man arrested for stealingattack victim's ring

Floods in Mexico


19SUNDAY 4 JUNE 2017 AMERICAS

Brasilia

Reuters

Former Brazilian lawmaker Rodrigo Rocha Loures, a close aide and friend of

President Michel Temer, was arrested at his home yesterday in a corruption investigation that also targets the president, a fed-eral police spokesman said.

In a police video released on May 19, Loures was seen running out of a Sao Paulo restaurant car-rying a bag with 500,000 reais ($154,000) in cash that prosecu-tors say was a bribe from the owners of the world's largest meatpacker, JBS SA.

Plea-bargain testimony by two executives of JBS's holding company J&F Investimentos SA implicated Temer and other politicians in graft and led pros-ecutors to accuse Loures of being a middleman for Temer, which the president has denied.

Temer's office had no immediate comment on the arrest of his former aide.

The Supreme Court author-ized the investigation of Temer and Rocha Loures for corrup-tion, criminal organization and obstruction of justice, trigger-ing the worst political crisis since Temer took over from impeached leftist Dilma Rous-seff last year.

Since the leaking of a recording of a late-night con-versation with a JBS executive in which Temer appeared to condone corrupt practices, the president has faced calls for his

resignation or impeachment.An electoral court investi-

gation of possible illegal campaign funding in Temer's 2014 election as vice president could also oust him from office.

Loures, a businessman-turned-politician, could seek a plea bargain, some sources in the prosecution team told Reu-ters this week. That could damage the president's case that he did nothing illegal.

Loures' lawyer, however, said yesterday that his client will not seek a plea deal. "My orientation is against it, and his family supports that," the law-yer, Cezar Bitencourt, said.

Bitencourt called the arrest "unnecessary" and said it was part of a strategy by prosecu-tors to pressure Loures into opting for the plea bargain. Last week, Loures turned over to police the cash-filled bag he was seen carrying in the leaked video.

Close aide to Brazil Presidentheld for graft

Caracas

Reuters

Banging empty pots and brandishing signs saying "only the government is

growing fatter," Venezuelan activists in Caracas yesterday protested food shortages in the crisis-stricken country.

The march by a few hundred people, quickly halted by secu-rity officials firing tear gas, built on two months of near-daily demonstrations against leftist President Nicolas Maduro, who critics say has plunged oil-rich Venezuela into its worst eco-nomic crisis in history.

Protesters are demanding early presidential elections, free-dom for jailed activists, and humanitarian aid to allow in scarce medicines and food.

Currency controls that crimp imports, as well as ailing local farms, have left many supermar-ket shelves empty.

Around 93 percent of Vene-zuelans cannot afford to buy enough food and 73 percent of them have lost weight in the last year, according to a recent study by three universities.

Children begging in front of bakeries, restaurants, or

markets are now a common sight, while more and more peo-ple are salvaging food from the trash. Many in the middle class have hadto cut back on meat or vegetables and instead get by on cheaper starches.

"Sometimes I only eat once or twice a day. Today I couldn't find bread (for breakfast) at any bak-ery, and I came here because I

can't just stay home watching this country fall to pieces," said Con-suelo, a 60-year-old protester banging two spoons together at the march in western Caracas.

Traditionally a poorer, pro-government area, parts of western Caracas are now home to road barricades, graffiti read-ing "Maduro dictator!" and clashes between hooded youth

and National Guards."It's time for Nicolas Maduro

to listen to the people and finally leave," said Consuelo, adding that she prays every day for an end to the crisis.

But Maduro, a former bus driver and union leader elected in 2013 to replace the late Hugo Chavez, says he is not going anywhere.

Apartado

AFP

Police are using Black Hawk helicopters to scour the green banana fields of

northern Colombia in a newly intensified search for the coun-try's most-wanted drug boss.

With peace initiatives under way between the government and rebel groups, authorities are

fighting on another front to sta-bilize the country after decades of violence: the gangs that make Colombia the world's biggest source of cocaine.

Their top target is Dairo Antonio Usuga, alias Otoniel, leader of the country's biggest drug gang, the Gulf Clan.

"We have him within strik-ing distance," says Jose Angel Mendoza, head of the

anti-narcotics police division. "He has had to run for it at the last second, more than once."

The general spoke following search operations in the town of Apartado, where the force for-mally launched a major search operation on Thursday.

He gave out leaflets this week offering rewards for infor-mation about Usuga and his gang, and dropped stacks of

them from a helicopter over the town.

The US State Department has offered a $5m reward for Usuga's capture on a 2009 indictment by a New York court.

In its profile of Usuga it calls his gang "a heavily armed, extremely violent criminal organization comprised of former members of terrorist organizations."

Cash bribe

In a police video, Loures was seen running out of a Sao Paulo restaurant carrying a bag with $154,000.

Temer's office had no immediate comment on the arrest of his former aide.

Venezuelans protest food shortages

Opposition activists take part in a protest against President Nicolas Maduro's government banging on empty pots, in Caracas, yesterday.

Colombia police closing in on drug gang boss

20 SUNDAY 4 JUNE 2017MORNING BREAK

People attend the first New York art show by French writer Michel Houellebecq in Manhattan, New York.

New York art show

www.thepeninsulaqatar.com

LATEST NEWSUPDATE

FAJRSHOROOK

03.15 am

04.43 am

ZUHRASR

11.32 am

02.56 pm

MAGHRIBISHA

06.24 pm

07.54 pm

PRAYER TIMINGS 60 artist-painted pianos to be installed in NYCNew York

AP

Sixty pianos painted by artists and perform-ers will be placed around New York City for anyone who wants to play them.

A kick-off event for the street pianos will be held tomorrow in lower Manhattan. The ban-dleader for CBS' "Late Show with Stephen Colbert," Jon Batiste, will lead 60 pianists in playing Bach's "Prelude in C." The pianos will be in place through June 25. They are a project of Sing For Hope, a non-profit organisation that works to bring the arts to underserved communities. This summer will mark the sixth anniversary of the Sing For Hope pianos in New York. This year's pianos have been decorated by artists including Roberta Flack, Kate McKinnon of "Saturday Night Live" and the casts of several Broadway shows.

US Navy recovers cannon to identify 200-year-old shipwreckProvidence

AP

Now that a cannon that rested in waters off Rhode Island's shore

for two centuries has been raised, US Navy archaeologists are hoping to confirm that the ship that sank at the site was a schooner commanded by a War of 1812 hero.

In thick fog and heavy swells, the USS Revenge became ensnared in a reef off

Watch Hill in Westerly in 1811. Oliver Hazard Perry ordered his men to jettison guns, masts and the anchor, but lighten-ing the vessel didn't free it. It sank. The treacherous reefs, rocks and poor visibility kept the cannon and other artifacts hidden until 2005.

That year, recreational divers from Connecticut, Charlie Buffum and Craig Harger, found what's believed to be the naval schooner's wreck site. Navy divers

recovered the cannon May 24. It's the first artifact the Navy has raised from the site.

Buffum said it was exhil-arating to see the cannon brought ashore. "To see it finally break the surface after being down there for 206 years, it was just really, really cool," said Buffum, a brewery owner from Stonington, Connecticut.

The cannon was taken to a conservation lab at the Washington Navy Yard to be

desalinated and stabilized. It's encrusted with bits of sea life and calcium carbonate from the interaction between the iron it's made of and salt water. There are not many examples of early naval guns of this type, said George Schwarz, an underwater archaeologist with the Naval History and Heritage Com-mand. The command oversees the identification and man-agement of sunken naval vessels. "It's a tangible reach

back through naval history," he said.

Schwarz said he has a high level of confidence that the cannon is from the Revenge.

Perry's career languished after the wreck until he was sent to the Great Lakes during the War of 1812. He's remem-bered as the Hero of Lake Erie for defeating the British navy. He was famous for reporting simply, "We have met the enemy and they are ours," after the decisive battle in 1813.

HIGH TIDE 00:15 – 15:00 LOW TIDE 07:45 – 19:30

Strong wind at places daytime with

expected poor visibility. Hot daytime

with slight dust to blowing dust at

places at times.

WEATHER TODAY

Minimum Maximum31oC 41oC

Courtesy: Qatar Meteorology Department

Date post:	22-Sep-2019
Category:	Documents
Upload:	others
View:	0 times
Download:	0 times

OPINION UAE envoy's inbox reveals anti-Qatar campaign · Arab countries and placed 30th on global...

Documents