Volume 24 | Number 7865 | 2 RiyalsThursday 18 April 2019 | 13 Sha'baan 1440 www.thepeninsula.qa

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BUSINESS | 02 SPORT | 11

Messi demands more from Barca after win over United

Masraf Al Rayan announces

QR544m net profit for Q1

UNHCR gets largest individual donation from Sheikh Thani

THE PENINSULA DOHA

UNHCR, the UN refugee agency, announced yesterday a major indi-vidual contribution of more than $35m from Qatari businessman Sheikh Thani bin Abdullah bin Thani Al Thani (pictured above)for Rohingya refugees in Bang-ladesh and displaced Yemenis.

The donation, which is the largest UNHCR has received from an individual, covers a one-year cooperation agreement and two grant agreements and is worth $35,215,260.

The agreements were signed in Geneva, yesterday by UN High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi and Sheikh Dr. Khalid bin Thani bin Abdullah bin Thani Al Thani, on behalf of Sheikh Thani bin Abdullah bin Thani Al Thani, a generous Qatari lead

philanthropist and business person, with attendance of Sheikh Khalifa bin Thani bin Abdulla Al Thani and Dr. Ayedh Dabsan Al Qahtani.

The funds will be channeled via UNHCR’s initiative, a pro-gramme established in 2016 that is fully compliant with the prin-ciples of Islamic social financing and which provides an efficient and trusted way for people. One hundred percent contributions go directly to those in need. �P3

UNHCR receives $35m donation for Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh and displaced Yemenis. The agreements were signed in Geneva yesterday by UN High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi and Sheikh Dr. Khalid bin Thani bin Abdullah bin Thani Al Thani, on behalf of his father Sheikh Thani bin Abdullah bin Thani Al Thani, a Qatari lead-philanthropist, businessman and founder of Ezdan Holding.

YESTERDAY'S RESULTS Liverpool 4-1 FC Porto (Agg 6-1)Manchester City 4-3 Tottenham

Hotspur (Agg 4-4)

King Abdullah II of Jordan, Supreme Commander of the Jordanian Armed Forces, met yesterday with Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of State for Defence Affaris H E Dr Khalid bin Mohamed Al Attiyah at the Al Husseiniya Palace in Jordan, yesterday. The meeting dealt with bilateral relations and means to enhance them. �P2

Deputy Prime Minister meets Jordan's King

Work on first Cable-Stayed Bridge beginsTHE PENINSULA DOHA

The Public Works Authority (Ashghal) has started the construction of the first Cable-Stayed Bridge in Qatar and the conversion of Haloul Roundabout into a two-level interchange on Sabah Al Ahmad Corridor project.

The 1,200M-long bridge extends prior to Haloul Round-about through Faleh Bin Nasser intersection in Salwa Road to provide free traffic flow between Hamad International Airport and the areas of Bu Hamour, Mesaimeer and Al Waab. The new bridge will consist of four lanes in each direction to

accommodate more than 16,000 vehicles per hour.

Due to the length of the bridge, construction work will require the use of 854 precast con-crete pieces, each weighing about 200 tonnes of reinforced concrete and 20 pylons and 16 piers to reach the highest point of the bridge to 30M height. �P3

Sheikh Thani bin Abdullah bin Thani Al Thani

02 THURSDAY 18 APRIL 2019HOME

Amir condoles with President of CongoDOHA: Amir H H Sheikh

Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani

and Deputy Amir H H Sheikh

Abdullah bin Hamad Al Thani

sent yesterday cables of con-

dolences to the President of

the Democratic Republic of

Congo, Felix Tshisekedi, on

the victims of the sunken ship,

wishing the injured a speedy

recovery. QNA

OFFICIAL NEWS

Cabinet praises results of sixth CMC electionsQNA DOHA

The Cabinet which met yesterday with Prime Minister and Interior Minister H E Sheikh Abdullah bin Nasser bin Khalifa Al Thani in the chair praised the sixth Central Municipal Council elections, which was held on Tuesday and had a large turnout of citizens.

Following the meeting, Min-ister of Justice and Acting Minister of State for Cabinet Affairs H E Dr Issa bin Saad Al Jafali Al Nuaimi

stated the Cabinet said these suc-cessful election is an addition to the democratic experience, in light of the wise leadership of Amir H H Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani. The Cabinet congratulated the winning candidates and wished them success in their mission to serve the country.

The Cabinet approved a draft law regulating the receipt and dis-bursement of Zakat funds, and decided to refer it to the Shura Council. Under the provisions of the draft law, the competent

department at the Ministry of Awqaf and Islamic Affairs shall receive and disburse Zakat funds in accordance with the aspects prescribed in Sharia.

The Cabinet also approved a draft law on public and private property of the state, and a draft law on temporary expropriation and appropriation of real estate for public benefit. The Ministry of Municipality and Environment has prepared the two draft laws in the framework of updating legislation to address the problems emerged

from the practical reality in this field, and to keep pace with the comprehensive urban plan of the State. The Cabinet then approved a draft decision of the Council of Ministers on the conditions and restrictions of the holders of the permanent residency card on treatment and education in gov-ernment institutions within the State. The draft decision was pre-pared in the context of the issuance of the executive decisions of the provisions of Law No. (10) of 2018 on Permanent Residency.

The Cabinet approved a draft decision of the Council of Ministers on the terms and conditions of the use of manors and the lands and houses of mainland. The Cabinet also approved a draft decision of the Minister of Municipality and Environment on the transfer of waste in the towers area. The Cabinet also listened to a presen-tation by the Minister on the general cleaning services.

The presentation included an overview of the general cleaning services provided by the Ministry

of Municipality and the Envi-ronment, the stages of devel-opment of services, the plan for the gradual provision of public cleaning services to the private sector, and the plan for waste treatment and recycling within the framework of the general strategy for public hygiene services.

The Cabinet stressed the importance of spreading awareness of the preservation of public cleanliness and the coop-eration of citizens and residents with the Ministry in this field.

Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of State for Defence Affairs H E Dr Khalid bin Mohamed Al Attiyah met yesterday with Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff of the Jordanian Armed Forces, Lieutenant General Mahmoud Freihat.

Qatar and Jordan sign defence agreements

QNA AMMAN

Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of State for Defence Affairs H E Dr Khalid bin Mohamed Al Attiyah met yesterday with Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff of the Jordanian Armed Forces, Lieu-tenant General Mahmoud Freihat. The meeting dealt with bilateral relations in the military

field. The Qatari Armed Forces and the Jordanian Armed Forces signed a number of joint cooper-ation agreements.

The agreements were signed by president of the international military cooperation authority Brigadier General Abdulaziz Saleh Al Sulaiti and Chief Executive of Barrer Holding Youssef Abdul-rahman Al Khulaifi on the Qatari side. It was signed on the Jor-danian signed by the Director of

Planning and Organisation, Brig-adier General Abdullah Hassan Al Hunaiti, and Director of Supply in the General Command of the Armed Forces, Brigadier General Mohammed Ali Al Manaseer.

The agreements aim to increase cooperation between the two armed forces and raise the level of the armed forces in administrative, technical, and organisational aspects.

An official reception

ceremony was held for the Deputy Prime Minister, which was attended by the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Inspector of the Armed Forces Major General Ghazi Awda Al Muqaibel, Commander of Royal Jordanian Air Force Major General (Pilot) Yousef Ahmed Al Hunaiti, Director General of Royal Medical Services Saad Jaber, and a number of ranking officers at the Jordanian Armed Forces.

The meeting was attended on the Qatari side by head of the authority of colleges and institutes Major General Hamad bin Ahmed Al Nuaimi, Commander of the Joint Special Forces Major General Hamad bin Abdullah Al Fetais Al Marri, Military Attache of the State of Qatar to the Kingdom of Jordan Brigadier General Shafi Mohammed Al Shafi, and a number of ranking officers at the Qatari Armed Forces.

QSRSN to hold training programme on autismDOHA: The Qatar Society for

Rehabilitation of Special Needs

(QSRSN) is set to organise a

comprehensive training pro-

gramme for autism awareness,

as part of its activities during

the autism awareness month.

It will begin on April 21, and will

last for four days. It includes

a series of lectures on autism,

the optimal intervention strat-

egy for autistic people, safety

and developmental charac-

teristics of autistic child, basic

diagnostic tests, and other

topics related to the care and

rehabilitation of autistic child

and the formation of posi-

tive relationships with them

and the use of technology to

develop their abilities. QNA

03THURSDAY 18 APRIL 2019 HOME

Sidra successfully conducts series of pediatric hip preservation surgeriesTHE PENINSULA DOHA

Sidra Medicine has successfully performed a series of hip pres-ervation surgeries on young patients using the modified Dunn procedure.

A recent surgery was per-formed on a young girl who pre-sented with considerable dis-comfort and a significant limp. The patient Eman, was referred to Sidra Medicine by Al Khor Hospital.

Eman’s condition was a result of a slippage of the growth plate at the top of her thigh bone called slipped capital femoral epiphysis. Slipped capital

femoral epiphysis is a condition that affects both components of the hip joint (ball and socket) and when the ball of the hip joint slips on the growth plate during growth. This leads to deformity of the ball and damage to the socket of the hip joint which can eventually cause premature arthritis of the hip joint in early adulthood.

After undergoing a thorough pre-surgery evaluation with the orthopedic surgery team at Sidra Medicine, Eman was scheduled for the pioneering modified Dunn procedure in February 2019. The complex four hour surgery was led by Pediatric Orthopedic Surgeon, Dr Talal

Ibrahim, along with Division Chief of Pediatric Orthopedic Surgery, Dr Jason Howard, and

Pediatric Orthopedic Surgeon Dr Abdelsalam Hegazy.

Dr Talal Ibrahim said, “The

modified Dunn procedure is the pinnacle of pediatric orthopedic surgery. We are happy to see

Eman thriving since the surgery was performed. She has started to fully bear weight on the left hip which is viable and stable. The patient’s family are very pleased with the result and that their daughter is now out of pain.”

Two months on, Eman is cur-rently receiving post-surgery care at Sidra Medicine and is soon expected to make a full recovery. Eman said, “Since the operation, I can go about my day without the pain and discomfort that was plaguing me before. The nurses and doctors here are really friendly and made my stay comfortable. Thank you for taking such good care of me.”

Eman is currently receiving post-surgery care at Sidra Medicine.

Qatar supports Arab World Institute, football exhibition with €250,000QNA PARIS

Qatar provided financial support worth €250,000 to the Arab World Institute for the Arab world and football exhibition which kicked off on Tuesday in Paris that will run till July 21.

The Ambassador of the State of Qatar to the French Republic, Ali bin Jassem Al Thani, handed over Qatar’s support for the exhibition to the President of the institute, Jack Lang.

The President thanked Qatar for its support and for keeping up with the institute’s events, which creates a space for interaction between Arab and French cultures. The Ambassador had participated in the opening of the exhibition, which was attended by French Minister of Foreign Affairs, Jean-Yves Le Drian, a number of Arab Ambassadors accredited to France, French and Arab VIPs from the sports and football fields.

Qatar participated in the engineering designs of the eight stadiums that were spe-cially built to host the 2022 World Cup Qatar. The Qatar pavilion received great interest and admiration from the audience.

Qatar has continued contributions to support the activities of the Arab World Institute in Paris and in

2015 allocated $2m to the rehabilitation and equipping of the Arab World Institute.

The Ambassador of the State of Qatar to the French Republic, Ali bin Jassem Al Thani, handing over Qatar’s support for the exhibition to the President of the institute, Jack Lang.

Qatari delegation in Malaysia to strengthen relationsQNA KUALA LUMPUR

A delegation from the State of Qatar which comprised of repre-sentatives from a number of ministries, companies, authorities, associations and businessmen, held a work visit to Malaysia to discuss promoting bilateral rela-tions between both countries in vital fields including economy,

investment, development, trade and industry.

The delegation was chaired by the Head of Department of Inter-national Cooperation at the Min-istry of Foreign Affairs, Ambas-sador Tariq Ali Al Ansari, with the participation of Ambassador of the State of Qatar to Malaysia, Fahad bin Mohammed Kafoud.

The delegation held in-depth technical discussions for three

days, with the Malaysian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and ministries of trade, industry, investment, agriculture, education, culture, sports and youth. They agreed to cooperate in a number of devel-opmental and operational projects and increase the economic coop-eration. In addition to improve cooperation in the aviation and airport management fields.

They also discussed

preparations for Doha hosting this fall the 14th edition of the World Islamic Economic Forum.

Both sides agreed on the importance of the discussions and what resulted from it as one of the successful outcomes of the visit held by Amir H H Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani to Malaysia last December and the talks H H the Amir had with Prime Minister of Malaysia Mahathir Mohamad.

Qatar becomes model in rights of workersTHE PENINSULA DOHA

Sheikh Dr Thani bin Ali Al Thani (pictured), Chairman of the Committee of the International Workers’ Day, has said that the celebration of the International Workers’ Day comes this year under the broad international praise of Qatar’s achievements in the field of labour rights.

“Qatar has become a model in the rights of workers based on a series of legislation and laws issued in recent months,” he added.

“The State of Qatar has made tremendous reforms in the labour laws to promote the rights and safety of workers in the workplace and improve their living and housing,” Sheikh Dr Thani pointed out, adding that expatriate workers from dif-ferent specialisations are partners in development and have made great efforts.

He stressed in a press statement that the State of Qatar is always working to provide all the comforts and legal and human protection of workers through issuing laws and legis-lation that ensure their better life. The ceremony, which will be held on May 1, will be attended by the Minister of Administrative Development, Labour and Social Affairs, and it is also coincides with the cen-tenary anniversary of the Inter-national Labour Organisation (ILO). A number of ministries, private and public entities will participate in the event.

About the slogan of the event, Sheikh Dr Thani stressed that the selection of the slogan aims at highlighting Qatar’s con-tribution to the rights of workers

in accordance with the wise vision of the leadership.

The guidelines of Qatar National Vision 2030 have also defined the need for legal legis-lation and administrative pro-cedures implemented by the Ministry of Administrative Development, Labour and Social Affairs, which work to improve the living conditions of expa-triate workers and provide all guarantees.

The ceremony will witness the announcement of the winners of 6th edition award. The award committee includes the Ministry of Administrative Development, Labour and Social Affairs; Ministry of Interior; Public Works Authority; Qatar Chamber; Qatar Foundation; Hamad Medical Corporation and Supreme Committee for Delivery & Legacy (SC).

Work on first Cable-Stayed Bridge beginsFROM PAGE 1

Haloul Roundabout will be revamped into a two-level interchange, which will include at-grade signalised inter-section along with the free flow Cable-Stayed Bridge. With the completion, the signalised intersection will consist of six lanes in each direction, including two right turns to the left and one for U-turn.

The intersection will help the traffic in all direc-tions to connect Sabah Al Ahmad Corridor to Halul Street and Salwa Road. It will serve Bu Hamour and Al Mamoora and many vital facilities surrounding the Wholesale Market and com-mercial activities on Salwa Road. Eng Abdullah Al Naiemi said that Ashghal has already started con-struction of the first Cable-Stayed bridge in Qatar, which was designed in a unique way to provide a free traffic flow without the need to pass through

roundabouts or light signals, especially that the bridge will pass over Halul intersection as well as Faleh Bin Nasser inter-section on Salwa Road, which will ease the congestion in the vital area significantly.

He explained that the bridge over Faleh Bin Nasser

intersection on Salwa Road will be without pylons at all for a dis-tance of 150 metres, but there will be cables to bear the bridge, pointing out that the completion of the bridge will be the first quarter of 2021, as well as the completion of Halul Intersection works 2020.

Sheikh Dr. Khalid bin Thani bin Abdullah bin Thani Al Thani (third right) with UN High Commissioner for Refugees, Filippo Grandi, and other dignitaries, in Geneva yesterday.

UNHCR gets largest individual donation from Sheikh Thani

FROM PAGE 1The donation will be split

into two parts: the first aims at providing around 300,000 inter-nally displaced persons, returnees and members of the host community across Yemen with multi-purpose cash assistance and cash for shelter

with an amount of $13,000,260. The second part aims to support an estimated 450,000 Rohingya refugees in Cox’s Bazar in Bang-ladesh with a focus on health, nutrition and shelter for a total amount of $22,215,000.

“This is an extraordinary contribution that will bring vital

help to hundreds of thousands of people whose lives have been torn apart by conflict and dis-placement,” said High Commis-sioner Grandi. “UNHCR is deeply grateful to H E Sheikh Thani bin Abdullah for his generous support.”

“It is a privilege and an

immense opportunity to support the most vulnerable people. We hope that, through the ‘Thani bin Abdullah bin Thani Al Thani Humanitarian Fund’ to support the displaced through UNHCR’s programmes,” said Sheikh Dr. Khalid bin Thani bin Abdullah bin Thani Al Thani.

The celebration of the International Workers’ Day comes this year under the broad international praise of Qatar’s achievements in the field of labour rights.

A computer-generated representation of the Cable-Stayed Bridge.

Al Marri meets participants of NHRC conference on combating impunityThe Chairman of the National Human Rights Committee (NHRC), Dr Ali bin Smaikh Al Marri, met with a number of participants in the international conference titled “national, regional and international mechanisms to combat impunity and ensure accountability under the law,” organised by NHRC, in cooperation with the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights and the European Parliament. He met with the Vice-President of the Kuwaiti Human Rights Bureau, Dr Siham Abdulwahab Al Fareeh; Interministerial Delegate for Human Rights in the Kingdom of Morocco, Ahmed Chaouqui Benyoub; Chief of Rule of Law, Equality and Non-discrimination Branch at OHCHR, Mona Rishmawi; Chief of Middle East and North Africa Section (MENA) at the OHCHR, Mohammad Alnsour; Vice-Chairperson of CEDAW in the UN, Nicole Ameline; and Vice-Chairman of the Advisory Committee at the UN Human Rights Council, Lazhari Bouzid. Dr. Al Marri thanked them for their participation in the conference and their valuable contribution during the discussion panels.

04 THURSDAY 18 APRIL 2019HOME

CEDAW official praises Qatar’s role in protecting human rightsIRFAN BUKHARI THE PENINSULA

Praising Qatar’s role in protecting human rights, Nicole Ameline, Vice-Chairperson of the Committee on the Elimi-nation of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) has said that countries must invest more in empowerment of women as they are the “leading force for peace”.

The Committee on the Elim-ination of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) is a body of independent experts that mon-itors implementation of the Con-vention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW).

The CEDAW Committee con-sists of 23 experts on women’s rights from around the world. Qatar acceded to the Convention in April 2009. “It was a great honour for me to speak at the international conference on ‘National, Regional and Interna-tional Mechanisms to Combat Impunity and Ensure Account-ability under International Law’ representing CEDAW Com-mittee. It is a very important event and thanks to Qatar and Qatar’s National Human Rights Committee (NHRC) for organ-ising the conference,” she said.

Talking to The Peninsula on the sidelines of recently-held two-day conference, Nicole

Ameline said that Qatar’s role in protecting and promoting women’s rights was an example for the region. “Qatar has also introduced many reforms.”

She said that the CEDAW Committee was ready to support Qatar to go further for acceler-ating the change. She said that everywhere in the world women were the first victims of crises and conflicts. “Meantime they are also the leading force for peace.”

In the region, she said, the CEDAW Committee has the hope to see change. “Not only women are the victims as they are being targeted in wars and in lots of other conflicts, situations but at the same time they are strong, intelligent and courageous therefore we are helping the world for making them leader of the future.”

Ameline said that the CEDAW Committee was fully committed and was observing rights violations being made against women in terms of torture, rape, or any other kind of rights’ violation in conflict zones and other countries. She said that it was the duty of the States to organise relevant response against those violations and deliver swift justice.

Ameline noted that a large number of women in the world were also facing different kinds of barriers in way to get justice like cultural or sometimes lin-guistic barriers. “We also ensure

that justice is totally independent and transparent.” “As women are not only the victims but also the leaders of peace therefore coun-tries must invest on empow-erment of women. When you are rebuilding a country (post con-flict), you should totally integrate women in new political framework. Their integration is necessary in the electoral system, design and implemen-tation of development programs.”

The Vice-Chairperson of the CEDAW Committee said that the committee was on ground eve-rywhere to support countries to achieve set goals. “We are very active and operational to make women new forces of sus-tainable change and peace.”

She said that women were also facing rights violations in many countries which were not in the grip of wars or conflicts. “To stop these violations, suffi-cient institutional response is needed. We supervise the imple-mentation of the Convention to prevent the creation of crisis like situation.”

She said that strong institu-tional framework and effective national machinery was a must for implementing the Con-vention. “We are supporting countries by providing help to develop such required responses.”

Nicole Ameline, Vice-Chairperson of CEDAW, Geneva, speaking to The Peninsula. PIC: SALIM

MATRAMKOT/THE PENINSULA

QGP joins forces with Genomics England to enhance research THE PENINSULA DOHA

Qatar Genome Program (QGP), a member of Qatar Foundation (QF) and part of Qatar Foundation Research, Development and Innovation, has signed a strategic research and development agreement with Genomics England, aimed at enabling novel scientific discoveries and providing medical insights in genomics and precision medicine.

The Memorandum of Under-standing (MoU) was signed at the 2015 building (QF Headquarters) by Dr Richard O’Kennedy, Vice President for Research, Devel-opment, and Innovation at Qatar Foundation, and Professor Mark Caulfield, interim CEO and Chief Scientific Officer of Genomics England. The agreement lays the foundation for Qatar and the UK to develop a joint collaboration focusing on areas of research in genomics that can have a global impact. “This partnership aims to foster our shared goals for advancement of precision med-icine and to facilitate common genomic research initiatives,” said Dr O’Kennedy.

“Together we can push the boundaries further towards a new era of medical practice, where genomics can play a central role.”

Professor Caulf ield

said,“Genomics is a global, multi-stakeholder endeavour trans-forming healthcare. This collab-oration will help expand the legacy of the 100,000 Genomes Project beyond the UK, and will allow us to better serve the diverse population of the UK. We are excited to share our expertise, and equally excited to learn from the approach of the Qatar Genome Programme.”

The MoU outlines a number of research activities between QGP and Genomics England, such as establishing common frame-works to standardize genomic strategies for healthcare imple-mentation; the evaluation of new technologies for whole genome sequencing; the cross-analysis of both national datasets; and the exchange of expertise related to educational programs.

Professor Asmaa Al Thani, Board Vice-Chairperson of Qatar Biobank and Chairperson of QGP, said, “This agreement will see our two projects benefiting from a strategic alliance and the pooling of research talent and resources from both nations.”

The Vice-Chairperson of the CEDAW Committee said that the committee was on ground everywhere to support countries to achieve set goals. “We are very active and operational to make women new forces of sustainable change and peace.”

Event highlights importance & benefits of integrating moral values into communities FAZEENA SALEEM THE PENINSULA

Importance and benefits of inte-grating moral values into commu-nities was highlighted during a discussion held at the 2015 building (Qatar Foundation Headquarters), in Education City yesterday.

The discussion on ‘Moral Values and Their Role in Addressing Societal Challenges’ featured, panellists who are jury members for the Akhlaquna Award, which aims to highlight the timeless and universal values exhibited by the Prophet Muhammad (PBUH).

Akhlaquna is an award intro-duced by H H Sheikha Moza bint Nasser, Chairperson of Qatar Foun-dation (QF), at QF Convocation 2017, to endorse the idea that knowledge

and morality are intertwined, guiding together the prosperity of societies.

The discussion as held as the finalists for the second Akhlaquna award are due to be announced next week.

The panellists include Chief Exec-utive Officer of Qatar Foundation for Social Work (QFSW), Amaal Al Mannai; Director of Wijdan Cultural Center, Dr Jassim Sultan; Dean of College of Islamic Studies at Hamad Bin Khalifa University, Dr Emad El Din Shahin; and Director of the National Center for Research in Islamic Sciences and Civilisation in Algeria, Professor Mabrouk Zeid Elkheir.

The discussion exchange of ideas, giving experts and audience members an opportunity to discuss the impor-tance and benefit of integrating moral

values into communities “Values play a major role in civ-

ilization. And civilization is about assuring rights and dignity of all indi-viduals. We can see the youth playing a major role in promoting values but we have to do much to protect rights of everyone,” said Dr Sultan.

“Akhlaquna is motivating people to promote values as the award is recognizing good work of people either they are Qataris or residents. The award is not just looking at their contribution in Qatar, the impact could have been made anywhere,” he added.

While, Dr El Din Shahin shed light on the importance of education and learning in promoting values in the society. He also said that Akhlaquna award is promoting universal values and respect towards co-existence.

FROM LEFT: Dr Emad El Din Shahin, Dean of the College of Islamic Studies at HBKU; Amaal Al Mannai, CEO of Qatar Foundation For Social Work; Dr Jassim Sultan, Director of Wijdan Cultural Center, and Professor Mabrouk Zeid Elkheir, Director of the National Center for Research in Islamic Sciences and Civilization in Algeria, during a panel discussion at QF headquarters yesterday. PIC: BAHER AMIN / THE PENINSULA

The agreement lays the foundation for Qatar and UK to develop a joint collaboration.

05THURSDAY 18 APRIL 2019 HOME

Baladna juice hits markets, in six flavoursMOHAMMAD SHOEB THE PENINSULA

Baladna Food Industries, Qatar’s main producer of fresh dairy, has entered into fruit juice market. The Qatari company’s juice products in six different flavours have already hit the local market, announced a senior official of the company yesterday.

Baladna’s 100 percent natural fruit juice with no added sugar, colour and preservatives are made from fruit concentrate. Some of the popular flavours include orange, apple, pineapple, pomegranate, fruit mix and tropical mix fruits. Currently they are coming in 1.5 litre bottle format, and are expected to be available in smaller formats as well.

Baladna’s entry to juice sector is being considered a significant step in making the country

self-sufficient in the area. After the blockade food and beverages are coming from different parts of the world providing consumers with multiple options, and now with Baladna juice products hitting the market, they will have additional options at more competitive prices.

“We have lots of innovations coming to the Qatari market, especially with regard to juice. We have just started the journey with regard to producing juice. Baladna juice products in six flavours hit the market last week. It is available in many supermarkets and hypermarkets, including LuLu,” Maher Eldaly, Senior Marketing Director of Baladna, told The Peninsula on the side-lines of an event.

Eldaly added: Before the beginning of this holy month of Ramadan our juice products will be available almost in all retail

outlets across the country.”Asked if the company has

plans to reintroduce glass bottles, he said that glass bottles are not very easy to handle and they are also much more expensive than the plastic bottles.

“We need to be prudent with regard to our customers. Plastic bottles are the best solutions

available today to cater to the 100 percent need as we are required to be prudent about covering the 100 percent self-sufficiency mission in line with Qatar’s vision. This is a very big responsibility that we are trying to fulfill.”

The company, which was established in 2014 as a small farm, ramped-up production immediately after the blockade in early June 2017. And within a short span of 20 months, it imple-mented the first and second phases of its huge expansion. Cur-rently, Baladna produces about 320 tonnes of fresh milk from over 30,000 cows; many of them were airlifted from North American countries, that helped the company grab headlines in the local, regional and international media. Eldaly, earlier speaking at a networking event organised by the Canadian Business Council in collaboration with Qatar Australia

New Zealand Business Association (QANZBA) yesterday, said that Baladna aims at establishing a solid brand foundation in Qatar and other markets, and constantly investing on innovation and product diversification.

“We are trying to diversify our product range in line with the

Qatar’s goal. We have already achieved 100 percent self-suffi-ciency in terms of fresh milk pro-duction and have acquired nearly 95 percent of the market share. With regard to Laban and Yogurt we are meeting nearly 51 percent and 49 percent of the local market demand, respectively,” he said.

Maher Eldaly, Senior Marketing Director of Baladna

HIA hosts Smart Security Management Group meetTHE PENINSULA DOHA

Hamad International Airport (HIA) is hosting the 17th meeting of the Smart Security Management Group (SSMG) in Doha. The two-day meeting, that began yesterday, is taking place at HIA’s premises, and is attended by approximately 25 delegates including official observers and Airports Council International (ACI) organisers.

The ACI Smart Security ini-tiative aims to implement spe-cific and measurable improve-ments in security effectiveness, operational efficiency and pas-senger experience at airport security checkpoints through improved use of technology, process innovation, and the use of risk-based security concepts. As airports and their stake-holders play a key role in facil-itating effective, efficient and enhance passenger experiences,

the Smart Security initiative gathers stakeholders with the shared objective of trans-forming the security checkpoint for the benefit of the travelling public.

Engr Badr Mohammed Al Meer, Chief Operating Officer at Hamad International Airport, commented: “We are thrilled to host the 17th annual Smart Security Management Group meeting at Hamad International

Airport. As an active member of ACI Asia Pacific’s Regional Security Committee, and through our Smart Security Program, we are among the few leading air-ports in the world to consistently trial and improve our security processes at HIA for increased efficiency and for the comfort of our passengers.”

ACI World Director General, Angela Gittens, commented: “We thank Hamad International

Airport for hosting the 17th annual Smart Security Man-agement Group meeting. With the predicted growth in air travel, evolving security threats, and passengers’ evolving expec-tations about their airport expe-rience, it is more important than ever that airports forge sus-tainable security models that optimise their facilities and meet the growing demands of their passengers.”

The delegates, observers and ACI organisers at HIA during the Annual Smart Security Management Group Meeting.

13th Al Jazeera Forum to address political, strategic & media issuesTHE PENINSULA DOHA

The 13th Al Jazeera Forum will be held at Sheraton Grand Doha Resort and Convention Hotel on April 27 and 28, under a theme of ‘The Gulf: From Crisis to Decline of Strategic Influence’.

Al Jazeera Centre for Studies highlighted the topics and panels of the upcoming Forum in a press conference at its headquarters in Doha on Tuesday.

This year’s focus is on the theme ‘The Gulf: From Crisis to Decline of Strategic Influence’ with the participation of 30 speakers, including analysts, academicians, opinion makers, and politicians from several geog-raphies. Nearly 500 guests from inside and outside Qatar are expected to attend this annual event.

Addressing the press con-ference, AJCS Director Dr

Mohammed Mukhtar Al Khalil explained this year’s forum addresses several inter-related political, strategic and media issues. One of them is the stalemate in relations between the GCC states and the open-ended crisis that broke out between Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Bahrain, and Qatar in June 2017.

He said the speakers will present their observations and analyses of these relations amidst the decline of the strategic signif-icance of Arab Gulf countries, par-ticularly Saudi Arabia.

Al Khalil also indicated that the forum will shed light on US policy towards the Middle East and its implications for the Pal-estinian cause, especially with the upcoming announcement of the so-called ‘Deal of the Century’ coinciding with the accelerating normalisation of certain Gulf countries with Israel.

06 THURSDAY 18 APRIL 2019HOME

Joyalukkas announces ‘Gold Fortune’ on the occasion of Akshaya TritiyaTHE PENINSULA DOHA

Akshaya Tritiya, the auspicious festival of pros-perity is here and the world’s favourite jeweller has announced their promotion for the auspi-cious occasion.

Some of the all new Joyalukkas Akshaya Tritiya 2019 was unveiled by Bollywood icon Kajol Devgan in India. Continuing the tra-dition of giving its patrons an opportunity to own their favourite jewellery and bring home

QU announces winners of Sheikh Faisal bin Qassim AwardTHE PENINSULA DOHA

The College of Education (CED) at Qatar University (QU) in collaboration with AlFaisal Without Borders Foundation (Alf), organised a ceremony to announce the winners of the Sheikh Faisal bin Qassim Award for Educational Research.

The ceremony took place in the presence of President of QU, Dr Hassan Al Derham; Alf Founder and Chairman, Sheikh Faisal bin Qassim Al Thani; Dean of College of Education, Dr Ahmed Al Emadi and a large number of faculty and inter-ested persons.

For the fifth consecutive year, CED and Alf award aca-demic researchers, post-graduate students, teachers and education leaders who have demonstrated excellence in sci-entific research, with the aim of promoting research, increas ing knowledge , enhancing educational prac-tices and developing education policies.

Dr Hassan Al Derham spoke at the event saying, “There may be a unanimous understanding of the importance of scientific research but educational research also holds particular importance as a foundation for societies. Therefore, it is natural that education research becomes a priority for countries in the developing world and can

be used as a measure of the quality of education in the state.”

He added, “The State of Qatar has officially demon-strated its support for scientific research through the presence of many organizations, institu-tions and funds supporting sci-entific research and the pro-vision of prizes for distin-guished Arab scholars. The Sheikh Faisal Bin Qassim Award for Educational Research, is important in pro-viding an important platform to promote a culture of educa-tional research in the Arab world , of fer ing Arab researchers the opportunity of joint research work, exchange of experiences or publicising

the efforts of researchers and publishing their research outputs.”

At the end of the ceremony, the winners were announced. In the category of academics two from QU won first place: Director of National Center for Educational Development, Dr Abdullah Abu-Tineh, and Pro-fessor of Education Man-agement, Prof Hissa Sadiq. Second place was awarded to Kashef N Zayed and Petra Jansen of Sultan Qaboos Uni-versity in Muscat. Dr Ahmed Mustafa from QU won third place along with a number of researchers from Western Sydney Univers i ty in Australia.

In the postgraduate cat-egory Rahma Saleh Al Armiya from Sultan Qaboos Uni-versity won first place, Rania Sawalhi from Qatar Uni-versity won second place and Amina Mohamed Ibrahim Zowgi from Mohammed V University at Agdal in Morocco won third.

In the category for teachers and educational leaders Nasser Jassim Al Malki, Director of Ahmed Mansour Primary School for Boys (Qatar), won first place; Ibrahim Atif Swelim from Khalifa Secondary School for Boys (Qatar) second place; and in third place Nabeel Al Saih and Hussam Asal from Hamza Bin Abdul Muttalib School (Qatar).

Sheikh Faisal bin Qassim Al Thani (right) and QU President Dr Hassan Al Derham at the event.

German Bundestag Vice-President discusses climate change at GU-QTHE PENINSULA DOHA

The Vice-President of the German Bundestag (Parliament), Claudia Roth, was at Georgetown University in Qatar (GU-Q) recently for a public talk on the rising threat of climate change to the health, safety, and security of women and girls worldwide.

In a lecture titled “Women’s Rights, Global Feminism and Sus-tainable Development: Time for a Change,” the German parlia-mentarian and human rights activist explored the many ways that environmental changes have had an outsized impact on the most marginalised members of society. And she urged the audience, which included stu-dents, faculty, staff, members of the diplomatic community, and the Ambassador of Germany to Qatar, Hans-Udo Muzel, to seek solutions to these problems.

“There are major social policy challenges and issues that will affect your generation, so I’m especially pleased to be speaking with you today. The answer to these difficult questions don’t lie in Germany or Qatar alone. They can only be found in global

partnerships. This requires a diverse array of players, including politicians, a free and vocal civil society, activists, academics, uni-versities, school students, and stu-dents like you — the makers of tomorrow’s world,” she began.

In her presentation she explained that the climate crisis presents major risks by reinforcing existing structural gender discrim-ination. Women face higher mor-tality rates in the floods and heat waves caused by climate change as a result of unequal access to information and resources about the threats. Women also serve as caretakers to children and extended family, she said, making

it more difficult to seek safety. And with food security at risk due to climate change, she added, more women work in agriculture instead of seeking an education and employment, losing out on the financial security and access to needed resources they bring.

At the talk, she was introduced by the Dean of GU-Q, Dr Ahmad Dallal. “It was a wonderful oppor-tunity to have this enriching dia-logue with an influential lawmaker and humanitarian advocate, where our students could apply classroom theory to lived realities and per-spectives, and gain a unique understanding of the complexities of our world.”

The Vice-President of the German Bundestag (Parliament), Claudia Roth, during the talk.

For the fifth consecutive year, CED and Alf award academic researchers, postgraduate students, teachers and education leaders who have demonstrated excellence in scientific research, with the aim of promoting research, increasing knowledge, enhancing educational practices and developing education policies.

Winners of Qatar e-Nature schools contest honouredTHE PENINSULA DOHA

Under the patronage of Minister of Education and Higher Education H E Dr Mohammed Abdul Wahed Ali Al Hammadi, the 6th Edition of the Qatar e-Nature schools contest concluded with an award ceremony that was held yesterday at Wyndham West Bay Hotel.

Sasol, the international inte-grated chemicals and energy company, launched the 2019 schools contest in cooperation with the Ministry of Education and Higher Education and Friends of the Environment Centre (FEC) last November.

During the contest, the Qatar e-Nature team visited many schools to promote awareness of Qatar’s rich natural environment and encourage schools to partic-ipate. Qualification rounds were held at Al Markhiyah Primary School for Girls during March.

The final round of the com-petition took place during the award ceremony, where the

qualified teams competed to answer questions that tested their knowledge on Qatar’s nature and wildlife, all based on the infor-mation provided through the Qatar e-Nature mobile application.

Umm Salama Primary School for Girls school, emerging as the winner of the contest, was awarded gold medals and vouchers to the value of QR9,000. In second place was Lebanese school, winning silver medals and vouchers for QR6,000.

English Modern School – Al Wakra Campus came in third place, winning bronze medals and vouchers for QR4,500 while Al Shifaa Bint Abdul Rahman Al Ansaria School for Girls came in fourth, winning vouchers for QR3,000.

The ceremony was attended by representatives of the Ministry of Education and Higher Edu-cation, Sasol, FEC, and the media. Students’ families and teachers were also in attendance sup-porting the various teams.

Fatima Al Obaidli, Head of

Programs and Activities at the Ministry of Education and Higher Education, said: “We are very pleased to witness yet another success with this year’s Qatar e-Nature Schools Contest. This social initiative is not only a model of an effective partnership between the Ministry of Education and Higher Education, Sasol and FEC, but also a testament to the very fruitful results of fusing edu-cation, technology, and a passion for our environment.”

Friends of the Environment Centre Director, Farhood Al Hajiri added: “The Qatar e-Nature Schools Contest serves an important message to all members of society- that caring for and learning about Qatar’s rich envi-ronment is a shared responsibility. We thank Sasol and the Ministry of Education and Higher Edu-cation for their efforts and coop-eration in making the Qatar e-Nature Schools Contest a suc-cessful vehicle in conveying that message and instilling environ-mental awareness in our younger generations.”

prosperity, Joyalukkas has announced ‘Gold Fortune’ Offer to celebrate Akshaya Tritiya.

Under ‘Gold Fortune’, patrons will be rewarded with free Gold Coins on purchase of Gold, Polki, Pearl and Diamond jewellery. The exclusive col-lection features a wide range of traditional and contem-porary jewellery and is available across all Joyalukkas outlets around the world.

During the unveiling of the Akshaya Tritiya Collection, Joy Alukkas, Chairman & MD, Joy-alukkas Group, said: “Akshaya Tritiya is a very special day for us, as it gives us the opportunity to serve our patrons with good luck and fortune. Our exclusive Akshaya Tritiya collection sig-nifies unparalleled crafts-manship and unique designs with the continued trust of Joy-alukkas. I welcome our patrons to bring home happiness and prosperity by taking advantage of our Gold Fortune Offer, and I wish them a Happy Akshaya Tritiya.”

Bollywood star and Joy-alukkas Brand Ambassador, Kajol Devgan, said, “I got the previlage of unveling some of the auspicious Akshaya Tritiya collection at Joyalukkas and it was an absolute delight to see the exclusive designs first hand, at one glimpse,

I felt like wanting to wear

them all. I also take this oppor-tunity to wish everyone hap-piness and prosperity on the auspicious occasion of Akshaya Tritiya.”

During the Gold Fortune Offer period, customers will be rewarded with a free 1 GM 22k Gold Coin on purchase of Diamond, Polki and Pearl jew-ellery. On the Akshaya Tritiya Day (May 7, 2019), customers will enjoy a free 0.200 GM 22k Gold Coin on purchase on Gold Jewellery.

Jewellery lovers can also avail the Joyalukkas pre-booking advantage to book for their favourite jewellery and beat the festive rush.

07THURSDAY 18 APRIL 2019 HOME

QF’s programs empower and inspire youth across the country FAZEENA SALEEM THE PENINSULA

Each year, thousands of students from schools across Qatar participate in Qatar Foundation’s (QF) community classes, summer camps, workshops, debates, sporting competitions, and events such as The Hague International Model United Nations (THIMUN) Qatar. And their expe-riences have helped to shape their lives.

Among them, an aspiring medical student, Aisha Al Hammadi, Grade 12 student at Doha British School (DBS), took part in various programs at QF partner university Weill Cornell Medicine-Qatar (WCM-Q). It included Healing Hands program, the Pre-College Enrichment Program and Qatar Aspiring Doctors Program – all of which cemented her desire to be a physician.

But the greatest change-maker in her life, according to her, was her first par-ticipation in THIMUN Qatar, which is organised by QF’s Pre-University Education,

“Until the first time I took part in THIMUN Qatar, I didn’t even know that I had leadership qualities or effective communication skills,” said the 17-year-old, who is now the press secretary for DBS’ Model United Nations (MUN). “In fact, I was intimidated by my first THIMUN. At the same time, watching others taught me that if I truly wanted to

change lives around me, I needed to get out of my comfort zone.

“So, during my second participation in THIMUN Qatar, I made a point of being more assertive and proactive. The event also made me aware of global issues; how important they are and how, even as stu-dents, each one of us have a responsi-bility to society.”

“I want to study medicine at WCM-Q. And in summer, I also look forward to joining a biotechnology program at Carnegie Mellon University in Qatar (CMU-Q), also a QF partner university,” she said.

James McDonald, DBS’ Vice-Prin-cipal, directs the school’s MUN program, and said that QF through its training pro-grams has helped to cultivate a culture of high expectations and achievement among the youth in Qatar.

Another example of the extent of QF’s outreach is Delhi Public School – Modern Indian School (DPS-MIS). Its students reg-ularly attend the camps, courses and pre-university sessions organised by CMU-Q, WCM-Q, and fellow QF partner university Texas A&M University at Qatar.

DPS-MIS middle or high school students have benefit so much from the events organised by QF member QatarDebate, and THIMUN Qatar. Such is the interest created by the two initiatives that almost 400 of the school’s students apply to participate

in them each year. For the past five years, DPS-MIS has

sent one of the largest contingents of any school in Qatar around 100 stu-dents to each THIMUN Qatar event. Likewise, since 2009 when it began par-ticipating in QatarDebate the school’s teams have been champions in a majority of those nine years. And QF also invited DPS-MIS to participate in

QatarDebate’s university league – the only school to be invited to do so.

Jaya Majumder heads the QatarDebate training at DPS-MIS and she said, “Traditionally, students from India choose science subjects, or com-merce and business streams, for their higher secondary and university studies,” said Majumder. “However, we’ve noticed that some of our students who have

attended QatarDebate or THIMUN Qatar, and debated on global issues, show an interest in humanities subjects such as economics and political science.”

Sandra Ramachandran is one of them and a prime example of how QF’s cycle of influence moves beyond Qatar, and out into the world. A few years ago, like her classmates, Ramachandran had decided to pursue a career in either engi-neering or healthcare but her first par-ticipation in QatarDebate opened up a whole new world of possibilities for her.

“I knew I would be swimming against the tide, when compared to my peers, if I decided to study humanities in higher secondary and at university, but that’s how QF transforms you; it empowers you to believe in yourself and follow your heart,” she said.

Unable to find an Indian high school in Qatar that could cater to her new-found interest in political science, she chose to move to India for her Grade 11 and 12 studies.

The ball of change that QF set in motion in her life, however, didn’t stop rolling with that re-location. Missing the debating sessions she had in Doha, and the global perspective they gave her, she helped to organise a debating club and the first MUN event in her new school. Now, as a Grade 11 student in India, she trains fellow students in the art of debate.

Sandra Ramachandran at a QatarDebate function.

THE PENINSULA DOHA

Qatar Manpower Solutions Company (Wisa) has signed a Memorandum of Under-standing (MoU) with Ezdan Hotels group. The MoU was signed by Hussain Ali Al Hababi, CEO of Wisa, and representative from Management of Ezdan Holding Group and Ezdan Hotels Group. The signing of the joint agreement was held at the Ezdan Palace Hotel.

As part of the agreement, Ezdan will provide intensive and varied workshops for trainees nominated by Wisa, run in con-junction with Ezdan’s core services related to the field of housework, etiquette and so on. Al Hababi said: “This agreement comes within the framework of the company’s commitment to providing qualified labour, and one of its main objectives towards pro-viding qualified workers capable of meeting the needs of both citizens and residents.”

“In addition, this agreement marks the

beginning of the desired cooperation between the two entities. We are keen to train and qualify individuals in basic skills according to the selected specialisation, as well as guide and enhance skills in occupational health and safety, education, and awareness of the values and teachings of society.”

Ezdan Hotel Management said, “As a leading hotel and hospitality company and proud to be managing the largest hotel chain in Qatar, it is always striving to achieve

excellence in its cadres and human resources that have contributed to the success of hotels to this level and to enhance its brand in the market Qatar.”

“In addition, we are proud of this part-nership with WISA because it reflects the company’s keenness to take advantage of the latest institutional, human development and employee care in order to achieve better performance and increase hotel operations,” it said.

The officials of Wisa and Ezdan Hotels Group exchanging a document after signing the MoU.

Qatar Manpower Solutions signs MoU with Ezdan Hotels Group

Thyroid Cancer Conference starts tomorrow THE PENINSULA/DOHA

The Qatar Cancer Society (QCS) will host the Qatar International Thyroid Cancer Conference under the patronage of Prime Minister and Interior Minister H E Sheikh Abdullah bin Nasser bin Khalifa Al Thani, from tomorrow.

The two-day conference under the theme ‘Present Standards and New Per-spectives,’ will be held at Ritz Carlton Doha.

The conference is a Category 1 - Accredited Group Learning Activity as defined by the Qatar Council for Healthcare Practitioners - Accreditation Department and is approved for a maximum of 9 hours.

Thyroid Cancer Conference is a global platform more than gathering 1,200 specialist and an expert in various areas that have to do with Thyroid cancer from a number of Arab and foreign countries such as Austria, Oman , Kuwait, in addition to the participation of a number of authorities of the State of Qatar highlighted by the Ministry of public Health, Hamad Medical Corporation and Qatar Doctor’s Society. On the sidelines of Thyroid Cancer Conference on April 19 and 20, awareness workshops under the slogan ‘Thyroid ... vitality’ will be held. The workshops will include a number of topics. The first, on April 19, will target the public and includes an awareness session about the available services in Qatar for problems of thyroid gland, methods of self-examination and medical consultation for skin care for people with thyroid cancer.

The second workshop on April 20 will target people living with thyroid cancer. The topics to be covered include medical advice required at a stage after treatment, yoga exercises for thyroid health to reduce stress, detection methods, and free medical tests and consultations for thyroid gland.

As part of the agreement, Ezdan will provide intensive and varied workshops for trainees nominated by Wisa, run in conjunction with Ezdan’s core services related to the field of housework, etiquette and so on.

Katara, Qatar Basketball Federation sign agreementTHE PENINSULA DOHA

Within its keenness to expand its community partnerships and support to sports, the Cultural Village Foundation – Katara signed a Memorandum of Coop-eration (MoC) with the Qatar Basketball Federation (QBF) yesterday. The MoC was signed by Dr Khalid bin Ibrahim Al Sulaiti, General Manager of Katara, and Ahmed Abdel-rahman Al Muftah, QBF Pres-ident, during a press conference where they announced the launch of the FIBA 3x3 World Tour Doha Masters at the Katara Amphitheatre.

The two-day sport event will be held today and tomorrow bringing together the best players in the 3x3 Individual World Ranking from all over the world.

“This collaboration with QBF is the result of continuous suc-cesses that we achieved together through hosting all the stars of International Basketball Cham-pionship in all its editions, which attracted a large public base and gained wide fame,” Dr Al Sulaiti said during the conference.

Net costs to the United States are much smaller because the country has also become a substantial producer of crude and condensates as a result of the shale revolution.

THE WASHINGTON POST

08 THURSDAY 18 APRIL 2019VIEWS

White House will tie Iran sanctions review to response by Saudi Arabia

The White House will have to weigh costs and benefits care-fully before tightening sanc-tions on Iran and Venezuela

further - and decide whether the eco-nomic price is worth the diplomatic gains.

If the White House toughens sanc-tions on Iran and Venezuela signifi-cantly (and the next decision on Iran sanctions is scheduled for the first week of May) any decision is likely to be tied to production increases by Saudi Arabia.

The White House is likely to agree to scale back Iran sanctions waivers if, and only if, Saudi Arabia commits to replacing the lost barrels at least one-for-one to leave the global pro-duction-consumption balance unchanged.

High-level discussions between the two countries over sanctions and production policy are likely to have begun already.

President Donald Trump spoke with Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman by telephone earlier this month about maintaining pressure on Iran and human rights, according to a statement from the White House.

The content of the discussions was not made public but it is safe to assume that oil prices, production and sanctions formed part of the dis-

cussion since they are central to the bilateral rela-tionship as well as policy towards Iran.

If sanc-tions are tightened, it will be because the White House believes it has an under-taking from Saudi Arabia to increase production by at least the equivalent amount, if not more, to

contain the impact on US motorists.The United States consumed 3.4

billion barrels of gasoline and 1.5 billion barrels of distillate fuel oil in 2018, according to the US Energy Information Administration (“Petroleum Supply Monthly”, EIA, March 2019).

For every $1 benchmark oil price rise because of sanctions, the first round costs for households and busi-nesses amount to roughly $5 billion per year (assuming increased crude

prices are passed on by refiners). Brent prices have already risen by

$22 per barrel since the start of the year, as a result of output cuts by the OPEC+ group of oil exporting countries as well as sanctions policies and other supply disruptions.

The impact has been similar to a tax increase of $110 billion per year on US households and businesses and will rise to $150 billion if prices continue heading upward towards $80 per barrel.

Net costs to the United States are much smaller because the country has also become a substantial producer of crude and condensates as a result of the shale revolution.

Domestic crude production is running at 4.3 billion barrels per year, so price rises have so far boosted domestic producers’ revenues by around $95 billion per annum.

The problem for the White House is that the households and businesses hurt by cost increases for gasoline and diesel fuel are not the same house-holds and businesses that benefit from higher crude prices.

Oil price increases hit motorists, manufacturers, farmers and transpor-tation companies across the country, while the gains are more concentrated in oil-producing states and communities.

Price changes therefore have dis-tributional effects and political conse-quences within the United States.

Most net oil-producing commu-nities and states backed the president strongly in the 2016 election and are expected to do so again in 2020.

By contrast, net-consuming communities include swing states that provided the president’s electoral college majority in 2016 and that he will need again to secure re-election next year.

In general, higher gasoline and diesel costs fall most heavily on swing voters, which is why the president has focused on the need to keep prices down rather than the benefits from price increases.

And the United States and global economies have slowed significantly since the first half of 2018 which will make another round of price increases more painful for US consumers and businesses.

The president has already warned OPEC, via messages published on Twitter, that global economy and financial markets are “fragile” and “cannot take a price hike”.

The political and economic cost-benefit calculation explains why the president has been pressing Saudi Arabia hard to increase its production to offset any further loss of barrels from Iran and Venezuela.

If sanctions are tightened, it will indicate the administration has secured the necessary deal on pro-duction from Saudi Arabia, even if the commitments remain private.

JOHN KEMP REUTERS

QUOTE OF THE DAYIt is my hope that the ongoing consultations will lead to a return to negotiations, to which I could devote the full

weight of my good offices, with the aim of reaching a lasting

resolution of the Cyprus issue.

Antonio Guterres UN Secretary-General

This scientific brain trust is needed, now more than ever

The launch of Sputnik by the Soviet Union on October 4, 1957, sent shockwaves through the United States, not

the least of which was a fear of being overshadowed in science and tech-nology. Physicists rose to the Cold War challenge. In 1960, a small group of them formed an independent organi-zation, known as the Jasons, to help the US government solve its most vexing technological problems. For more than six decades, the Jasons have labored every summer to tackle mind-bending challenges. Now, their future is in doubt.

On March 28, the Defense Department notified the MITRE Corp. that an expiring five-year contract for the Jasons would not be renewed because the “requirement has changed.” Only one study, on elec-tronic warfare, is to be completed. Rep. Jim Cooper, D-Tenn., chairman of the strategic forces subcommittee of the House Armed Services Committee, revealed the decision at a hearing on April 9, and it was confirmed by Steven Aftergood of the Federation of

American Scientists, as well as reports in Science and Nature. Cooper has asked the Pentagon to reconsider - and we agree.

If not reversed, the decision could effectively end a long and fruitful col-laboration of the best and brightest scientists with the US government. The candid advice of the Jasons, widely respected, has not always led to easy choices for policymakers, grappling with limited resources and political interests. The word of the Jasons may not be sitting well with an ideological administration like this one, so often at odds with scientists on climate change and other topics.

According to Nature, there are currently about 40 members of the Jasons, stellar academics with top-secret clearances, who spend the summer at La Jolla, California, working on 12 to 15 studies a year at a cost of $7 million to $8 million, including for the military, the intelli-gence agencies and the departments of Energy and Homeland Security. Ann Finkbeiner, author of “The Jasons: The Secret History of Sci-ence’s Postwar Elite,” a book about the group, documented their early

work on thorny problems arising from the nuclear weapons age, such as the test ban and questions about defense against ballistic missiles. In later years, the Jasons broadened out; by the end of the 1980s, members included computer scientists, astron-omers, geoscientists, mathematicians, materials scientists, engineers and oceanographers.

The 1990s brought more attention to biology and cybersecurity. Many of the group’s studies are classified, but some are public. Ms. Finkbeiner says the name Jasons was conferred by Mildred Goldberger, wife of founding member Murph Goldberger, after the Greek myth, because she thought of the advisers as golden heroes.

Today’s technology enigmas are no less daunting than those of the 1960s: climate change, antibiotic resistance, cybersecurity, genetic engineering, privacy and more. It is wrong-headed to jettison a braintrust like the Jasons. The scientists serve out of a sense of duty to the nation. The United States imprudently abolished the Office of Technology Assessmenttwo decades ago. It shouldn’t make a similar mistake now.

The State of Qatar is investing heavily in education and healthcare as the leaders of the country are well aware that a healthy society empowered with excellent education is the real wealth and power.

CHAIRMANSHEIKH THANI BIN ABDULLAH AL THANI

EDITOR-IN-CHIEFDR. KHALID BIN MUBARAK AL-SHAFIeditorinchief@pen.com.qa

ACTING MANAGING EDITORMOHAMMED SALIM MOHAMEDm.salim@pen.com.qa

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

ESTABLISHED IN 1996

EDITORIALAiming cutting-edge healthcare

The Qatar Genome Program (QGP) – an ambitious pop-ulation-based project aimed at positioning Qatar among the pioneering countries in the implementation

of precision medicine --signed a strategic research and devel-opment agreement with Genomics England, which will enable pioneering scientific discoveries providing medical insights in genomics and precision medicine. The memorandum of understanding (MoU) lays foundation for Qatar and the United Kingdom to develop a joint collaboration focusing on areas of research in genomics that can have a global impact.

The MoU will facilitate several research activities between QGP and Genomics England, such as establishing common frameworks to standardise genomic strategies for imple-mentation in healthcare, evaluation of new technologies for whole genome sequencing, cross-analysis of national data-sets and exchange of expertise related to educational programmes.

QGP, a member of Qatar Foundation and part of Qatar Foundation Research, Development and Innovation, is gen-erating large databases combining whole genome sequencing and other omics data with the comprehensive phenotypic

data collected by Qatar Biobank, enabling researchers to make breakthrough discoveries and help policymakers to better plan for future healthcare directions in Qatar. QGP’s efforts in collab-oration with Qatar Biobank, which collects samples from cit-izens and long-term residents and with Sidra Medicine, which facil-itate DNA sequencing, ultimately aims at precision medicines, pro-viding better future health and enabling Qatar to become a regional hub for advanced healthcare. QGP is supporting genomic researches targeting national priority diseases like dia-betes and cardiovascular dis-orders. Developing a compre-hensive Qatari genotyping array, the Q-Chip, incorporating locally relevant gene variants identified from whole genome sequence

data of thousands of samples, the first phase of which was completed last year with the handing over of the Q-Chip to H H Sheikha Moza bint Nasser on November 13, during the opening ceremony of World Innovation Summit for Health in Doha, is another major target of the project.

Genomics plays a vital role in treating rare diseases, which often have a genetic component. In about 80 percent of rare diseases, changes to DNA are involved in the cause. So identifying the genotype-phenotype associations relevant to a particular population will have a huge impact on the population by enabling the development of personalised healthcare for that particular population.

The State of Qatar is investing heavily in education and healthcare as the leaders of the country are well aware that a healthy society empowered with excellent education is the real wealth and power. QGP is a unique project in the region which involves large-scale investment and participation of researchers who are highly qualified and with exceptional skills and experience. The vision of the leaders of the Qatar, who are wholeheartedly dedicated to the service and bet-terment of the country, truly deserves applause.

French authorities do not suspect foul play, but they are investigating the circumstances that led to the fire, including interviewing members of five different companies that had been enlisted in renovation projects around Notre-Dame.

09THURSDAY 18 APRIL 2019 OPINION

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Technology forsecurity

The Notre-Dame fire ignites the West’s far right

D C PATHAK IANS

ISHAAN THAROOR THE WASHINGTON POST

I had the benefit recently of lis-tening to a well established American IT expert on the chal-lenges for security strategists in

these times of a literal tsunami of technological advancements. He brought out how the incredible speed at which technology was developing made it difficult to assess its repercus-sions for the future in terms of both global competition in business as well as the evolution of military domain. It confirmed my belief that while a security specialist could do without being a technology expert, a tech-nology advisor would succeed only if he or she had a complete grasp of security parameters and strategies - in this case the presenter fortunately

was aware of the importance of security orientation of technology advisors.

The tsunami of technology wit-nessed today can do two things - it can help development and a global advance on a positive note or add to the threat spectrum for vulnerable national entities. It is necessary that we do not see ghosts in a new tech-nology, do not look upon the speed of technology advancement as a threat by itself and have the ability to visu-alise and assess if something was adding up to a danger potential from both national and global angles.

Security is a ‘science’ in the sense that it rests on concepts, precision and detection of fault lines. It works on clarity - the bedrock of science - that admits of no compromise on this count. A nation and an individual have two basic needs, economic well

being and security. For development, technology seeks the ‘end’ in terms of product creation and product delivery but in the domain of security tech-nology has to provide at best a rolling improvement of ‘means’ in a situation where the goal post was never static - dependent as it was on the changing scenario set by the adversary. What does not change in security is the basic framework of requirements that held good in all contexts - national security, enterprise security or cyber security. All technology experts should have a good understanding of this in today’s world.

All advisors - technical or non-technical - who are on the security turf should know what a ‘secure perimeter’ around the identified subject of protection has to be, varying from a brick and mortar fence to a firewall, what ‘intrusion detection’ systems needed to be put in place, what would be the nature of ‘Access Controls’ and ‘Inner Access Controls’ required in that specific situ-ation and what was to be done for the ‘Insider Threat Management’. In cyber security, ‘hacking’ is an intrusion - though it is more like sabotage - that is detected only after it had happened so the prime response of the attacked entity has to be to safeguard what was left undamaged.

‘Access Controls’ begin with the confirmation of the identity of the person seeking to gain entrance. In the cyber domain, Log in and Appli-cation layer controls served the purpose. Security of information in transit or storage is maintained through encryption. ‘Inner Access Controls’ regulate entry into sensitive inner segments like Process areas, Command & Control Centre and the location of sensitive information.

Personnel Security has a limited technology paradigm and the Insider Threat Management that covers it is largely a human effort that used Intel-ligence tradecraft available with trained security professionals. Studies have shown that a vast majority of security breaches are traceable to

conniving members of the protected organisation. Scientists including tech-nology developers are used to trans-parency but in these days of ‘dual use’ they have to understand the compul-sions of ‘Need to Know’ - a basic practice in the security domain that ensured that the information sought by the adversary about a protected tech-nology would not be in possession of just any other member of the targeted enterprise. The real challenge for the security professionals lies in detecting signs of ‘vulnerability’ and establishing grounds for ‘suspicion’. An employee showing greed, addiction or disgrun-tlement is vulnerable to exploitation by the adversary. Signs of suspicion that the member might have been compro-mised already are unravelled in sur-prise checks, audits and operations that used special skills of Intelligence tradecraft such as surveillance, secret enquiries and tapping confidentially raised Informers.

Today, technology is used in a huge way in all security measures. In all situations however, human inter-vention and deduction are to be con-stantly associated with technology there. CCTV network can not do without human monitoring of the feed constantly or at least periodically. Response to a detected intrusion has to be guided by a human mind. A worker at the assembly line alone can notice any process flaw that needed to be rectified for better productivity. Change of Passwords, level of encryption and points of surprise checks are all decided by the con-cerned leaders. Data Integration and Data Analytics is done in the frame work set by the human masters.

Technology has achieved a great deal here by doing something that was earlier done only by human analysis producing ‘triggers’ for action. This is the much talked about turf of Artificial Intelligence that now even handles the preliminary part of ‘action’ that was needed in response to a ‘trigger’. Robots do this precisely as replacement of humans in certain sectors of ‘services’.

A strange - though not alto-gether surprising - thing hap-pened in the shadow of Mon-day’s tragedy. As many

around the world watched an iconic cathedral in Paris go up in flames, others immediately set about trying to spark new fires. On both sides of the Atlantic, denizens of the far right took to social media to grind their culture-warring axes, locating in the calamity a parable for the political moment - or, at least, their understanding of it.

Fox News host Tucker Carlson, a popular anchor accused by critics of openly embracing white nationalism in his broadcasts, said the Notre-Dame fire was in “some ways a met-aphor for the decline of Christianity in Europe”. His guest, far-right com-mentator Mark Steyn, took the oppor-tunity to declare that “Christendom was in retreat”, and Muslim immi-grants were taking over French society.

Without any evidence suggesting arson, some pundits immediately concluded that the blaze must have been the work of Islamists or leftists. Frank Gaffney, a once-fringe anti-Muslim conspiracy theorist, whose views have gained increasing traction within the Trump administration and Republican Party, issued a statement linking the fire at the cathedral to attacks on “Christian houses of worship” in France and a supposedly

Muslim-led campaign against Christianity.

“This pattern of attacks is a symptom of a Sharia-supremacist assault on Christianity in France, often enabled by the country’s intolerant secular left,” he said. “It suggests that the kind of persecution that is now afflicting some 300 million followers of Christ elsewhere around the world is coming full force to Europe as well.”

The same gesture was made by Alice Weidel, a leader of Germany’s far-right AfD party, who wrote a tweet connecting Notre-Dame’s burning to a spate of attacks on Christian sites in France. For a party that regularly inveighs against Muslim immigrants and the threat posed by Islam to Germany’s native culture, the subtext was clear.

French authorities do not suspect foul play, but they are investigating the circumstances that led to the fire, including interviewing members of five different companies that had been enlisted in renovation projects around Notre-Dame. Firefighters and rescue workers managed to save most of the cathedral’s most cherished art-works and relics. Its famous stained-glass windows are still largely intact. French officials vowed to rebuild and repair the damaged structure, and wealthy tycoons have pledged hun-dreds of millions in euros in support.

Yet for a coterie of conservative

thinkers, the fire itself marked a kind of irredeemable collapse. Steyn, speaking on Fox News, wondered what the point of rebuilding the cathedral was since, as he put it, the secular French no longer identify with the “soul” of the place. Others groused over the decades of supposed neglect hanging over the site. “Civilization only ever hangs by a thread,” wrote right-wing British commentator Douglas Murray. “Today one of those threads seems to have frayed, perhaps snapped.”

Ben Shapiro, an influential American right-wing pundit with a huge following on social media, lamented “a magnificent monument to Western civilization collapsing” and then followed up with tweets that insisted upon the “Judeo-Christian heritage” supposedly embodied by Notre- Dame and the duty of all to refamiliarize “ourselves with the phi-losophy and religious principles that built it.” Critics quickly noted the brutal treatment meted out on French Jews for centuries while the cathedral stood. Others suggested Shapiro’s invocation of “Judeo-Christian” values were in this instance simply a euphemism for “white.”

Richard Spencer, an American neofascist credited with coining the term “alt-right” for the online eco-system of far-right voices in the West, spoke more plainly. He tweeted his hope that the fire con-suming Notre-Dame would “spur the White man into action - to sieze [sic] power in his countries, in Europe, in the world” and, if so, the blaze “will have served a glorious purpose and we will one day bless this catastrophe.”

You can forgive Americans for their sense of shock at seeing an iconic structure far older than their own nation suddenly enveloped in smoke and flame. “Especially to cit-izens of the New World, the old one can look like it was chiseled in stone at the dawn of time,” wrote The Post’s Griff Witte. “Its cathedrals, castles, palaces and opera houses form a sturdy and permanent-seeming backdrop in a world increasingly dominated by ephemera.”

But the far-right obsession with Notre-Dame as an eternal lodestone of “Western” civilization is a dis-tortion of history. Its very “West-ernness” is itself a fuzzy construct:

Today, technology is used in a huge way in all security measures. In all situations however, human intervention and deduction are to be constantly associated with technology there.

Historian Juan Cole noted that the French Gothic tradition is deeply influenced not only by Greek pagan thought, but by the influence of Islamic architecture likely encoun-tered in Moorish Spain. Cole ges-tures to the migration of artistic styles from the other side of the Mediterranean: “Some art histo-rians have argued for the pointed arch as a Muslim development of a Sasanian Iranian form, which was then taken over into the Gothic cathedral.”

Whatever the case, for the French, the cathedral brims with national meaning that transcends its religious origins. And for aca-demics, there’s little immutable about a structure which has gone through myriad transformations since its construction. “Through the centuries, it’s been updated, amended, degraded and defiled,” Witte wrote about Notre Dame. “The spire that crashed so spectac-ularly on Monday was only added relatively recently, just a century and a half ago, following a period of profound neglect.”

The skylines of myriad world cities boast the spires and bell towers of renovated structures once laid low by disaster or war. “The towering cathedrals that dot Europe’s landscape are mostly monuments to resilience, testa-ments to what you could build after fire claimed what had been built before,” wrote medievalist Matthew Gabriele. “The radiant stained glass and soaring vaults that we see today were often direct responses to tragedy and disaster.”

Perhaps for that reason, leading officials on the continent don’t share the same apocalyptic view as the West’s far right. “It’s not the end of the world,” European Council President Donald Tusk said.

10 THURSDAY 18 APRIL 2019MIDDLE EAST / AFRICA

Turkey: US sanctions on Iran wrong ANATOLIA ANKARA

Ankara will continue telling the US that imposing embargoes on Iran is “wrong”, Turkey’s foreign minister said yesterday.

Speaking at a joint news conference with Iranian coun-terpart Javad Zarif, Mevlut Cavu-soglu said Turkish ministers had clearly conveyed their concerns about the sanctions during a recent visit to Washington.

“We will continue telling the US that the embargoes [on Iran] are wrong,” Cavusoglu said.

The US unleashed tough sanctions on Iran last November that hit core parts of the coun-try’s economy, including oil exports, shipping and banks.

He underlined the impor-tance of the solidarity and deci-siveness between Iran and Turkey on the issue.

Cavusoglu also criticised the US decision to put Iran’s Revo-lutionary Guards Corps on its terror list. “This is an extremely wrong decision,” he said, adding that the listing of foreign national armies as terror groups would lead to “dire” cracks in the international system and international law order. “Then, trust in the global system will suffer and there would be total chaos,” he added, urging caution. In an unprecedented move, US President Donald Trump on April 8 said he would formally designate the force a

“terrorist organisation”. The US move is the first time a gov-ernment agency has been black-listed a terrorist body, though parts of the guard had previously been designated, namely its elite external operations wing, the Quds Force.

Cavusoglu also said Wash-ington’s decision to recognise the occupied Golan Heights as Israeli territory, was against international law and would only increase tension in the region.

Zarif stressed that Tehran understood Turkey’s concerns about the threats posed against the country. “For us, the Turkish people’s peace and security is very important. We enjoy very thorough cooperation on this issue,” Zarif added.

Erdogan meets Iran’s FM over SyriaAFP ISTANBUL

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan yesterday met with Iran’s foreign minister, who arrived in Ankara to brief him on his meeting with Syria’s Pres-ident Bashar Al Assad.

Turkey supports Syrian opposition rebels and Iran backs Assad in Syria’s long war, but the two sides have been expanding contacts amid international efforts to end the fighting.

Kazakhstan will host a fresh round of Syria talks on April 25-26 in its capital, recently renamed from Astana to Nur-Sultan.

“I had a long interview with Bashar Al Assad. I will be giving details of these discussions to Mr. Erdogan,” Iran’s Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif told reporters in translated com-ments. Erdogan acknowledged in February that low-level con-tacts have been taking place and he has also softened tone in recent months.

Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said that they we have decided to cooperate with Iran for a political solution. Repeated rounds of UN-backed

Syria peace talks have failed to end the bloodshed, and Iran, Russia and Turkey have spon-sored the parallel so-called Astana negotiations since early 2017. Talks among the three

countries have focused on the -held bastion of Idlib in north-western Syria, local Syrian media have reported.

That region bordering Turkey, is mostly held by Syria’s

former Al Qaeda affiliate, Hayat Tahrir Al Sham. The September accord aimed to set up a buffer zone around Idlib, but was never fully implemented as militants refused to withdraw.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan (right) meets Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif in Ankara, Turkey, yesterday.

‘Trump veto proves US behind Yemen war’AFP SANA’A

Yemen’s Houthi rebels yesterday slammed President Donald Trump’s veto of a Congress reso-lution directing him to end support for the Saudi-led war in Yemen as proof Washington was behind the conflict.

The veto “proves that the United States is not only involved

in the war on Yemen but also was behind the decision to go to war,” Houthi spokesman Mohammed Abdelsalam tweeted. “Others followed that decision and execute the wishes and ambitions of the United States,” Abdelsalam added, referring to Saudi Arabia and its allies. Abdelsalam, who heads a rebel delegation involved in ongoing UN-led peace talks, held

the US responsible for “mas-sacres, crimes and the unjust siege of Yemen”.

Yemen and Mexico are the only two countries to have been targeted by a Trump veto.

The president overrode a congressional resolution that aimed to reverse the border emergency he declared in order to secure more funding for his wall between the United States

and Mexico in March.Congress’ Yemen resolution

was a harsh bipartisan rebuke to Trump that took the historic step of curtailing a president’s war-making powers — a step he con-demned in a statement announcing his veto.

Democrats argue that US involvement in the Yemen con-flict, which includes intelligence-sharing, logistical support and

now-discontinued aerial refu-elling, is unconstitutional without congressional authority. Trump said US support for the devas-tating war between the Saudi-backed Yemeni government and Houthi rebels, who control the capital Sana’a, was necessary to “protect the safety of the more than 80,000 Americans who reside in certain coalition countries”.

Report: Sudan’s formerpresident moved to prison AGENCIES KHARTOUM

Sudan’s former President Omar Al Bashir has been moved to Kobar maximum security prison, days after he was deposed in a military coup.

Reports said the ex-leader has until now been detained at the presidential residence under heavy guard, the BBC reported.

He is reportedly being held in solitary confinement and is surrounded by tight security.

The coup leader at the time, Awad Ibn Auf, said Al Bashir was being detained in a “safe place” after his removal.

He himself stood down soon

afterwards. Lt Gen Abdel Fattah Abdelrahman Burhan was then named as head of the transi-tional military council, to become Sudan’s third leader in as many days.

Demonstrators have vowed to stay on the streets until there is an immediate move to civilian rule. Witnesses near the prison in north Khartoum said there was a heavy deployment of sol-diers and members of a para-military group outside.

Scores of doctors in their white robes marched from Khartoum’s main hospital towards the sit-in, carrying banners and chanting: “freedom, peace, justice.” Libyan women shout slogans during a demonstration to demand an end to the Khalifa Haftar’s

offensive against Tripoli, at Martyrs’ Square in Tripoli, Libya, yesterday.

Six dead in Tripoli as UN debates ceasefireAFP TRIPOLI

The death toll from rocket fire on the Libyan capital Tripoli that the UN-recognised government blamed on strongman Khalifa Haftar climbed to six yesterday, as diplomats sought to negotiate a ceasefire.

Diplomats have long com-plained that Libyan peace efforts have been stymied by major powers backing the rival sides, with Haftar ally Russia quibbling over the proposed wording of the ceasefire demand even as the bombardment of Tripoli inten-sifies. Three of the six killed in

the rocket fire on the south Tripoli neighbourhoods of Abu Salim and Al Antisar late on Tuesday were women, said the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, or OCHA. Abu Salim mayor Abdel-rahman Al Hamdi confirmed the death toll and said 35 other people were wounded.

Journalists heard seven loud explosions as rockets also hit the city centre, the first since Haftar’s Libyan National Army militia launched an offensive on April 4 to capture Tripoli from the government and its militia allies. The LNA blamed the rocket fire on the “terrorist

militias” whose grip on the capital it says it is fighting to end.

The bombardment came as diplomats at the UN Security Council began negotiations on a British-drafted resolution that would demand an immediate ceasefire in Libya. The proposed text warns the Haftar offensive “threatens the stability of Libya and prospects for a United Nations-facilitated political dia-logue and a comprehensive political solution to the crisis.” After Britain circulated the text, a first round of negotiations was held during which Russia raised objections to references criti-cising Haftar, diplomats said.

Regime shelling injures 7 in IdlibANATOLIA IDLIB

Seven civilians were injured in shelling by the Assad regime in northern Syria’s de-escalation zone, the White Helmets civil-defence agency said yesterday.

The agency said that regime forces and Iranian-backed ter-rorist groups had targeted the

town of Al Tamanah — along with the villages of Abu Habbah and Al Hamdaniyah — in Idlib’s southern countryside.

Other attacks were reported in the town of Kafr Zita and the villages of Al Hawijah, Al Hewiza, Al Shria and Qalaat Al Madiq in the northern countryside of Hama province.

Last September, Turkey and Russia established a de-esca-lation zone in Idlib in which acts of aggression were expressly prohibited.

Syria has only just begun to emerge from a devastating conflict that began in 2011, when the Assad regime cracked down on demonstrators with unexpected severity.

Four dead in Mogadishu car bombAFP MOGADISHU

Four people were killed and five injured when a car loaded with explosives detonated on a busy road in Somalia’s capital Mogadishu, police said yesterday.

“So far we can confirm four dead and five wounded. We offer our condolences to the victims,” Somalia’s deputy police chief Zakia Hussein wrote on Twitter.

The explosion occurred along the busy Maka Al Mukarama road despite a recent increase in police check-points in the capital following a hike in bomb attacks by Al Qaeda linked Al Shabaab militants.

Turkey oppn win in Istanbul vote confirmedAFP ISTANBUL

Turkish election officials yesterday officially confirmed opposition candidate Ekrem Imamoglu’s win in last month’s disputed Istanbul election, his party said.

Erdogan’s Justice and Development Party (AKP) won most votes nationwide in the March 31 election. Cheering CHP supporters packed the street outside the local court-house in Istanbul where Ima-moglu, a former city district mayor, arrived to receive his mandate certificate from authorities.

“Ekrem Imamoglu got his mandate,” CHP Istanbul MP Engin Altay told crowds.

Lebanon Premier vows strict austerity reforms to avoid crashAP BEIRUT

Prime Minister Saad Hariri warned yesterday that Lebanon is heading toward an economic “catastrophe” unless the government implements strict austerity measures to reduce a ballooning budget deficit and massive national debt.

The stark warning came shortly after parliament passed amendments necessary to implement a plan to restructure the country’s crumbling

electricity sector. Restructuring the power sector, dysfunctional since Lebanon’s 1975-90 civil war, has been among key demands for reforms by the World Bank and international donors.

Outside parliament, hun-dreds of civil servants protested fearing the austerity measures to be adopted in the new budget would lead to wage cuts for state employees amid the economic crisis. The budget is still in the works and is expected to be sent to parliament for approval in the

coming weeks. The electricity plan was approved by a large majority in parliament yes-terday, days after it was agreed on by the government. The plan aims to eventually bring elec-tricity to Lebanese 24 hours a day, securing an additional 1,450 megawatts of temporary power by next year so that total output will reach 3,500 megawatts - enough to provide power around the clock. In the longer term, the plan calls for power production to be increased by more than 3,000 megawatts.

Cavusoglu also criticised the US decision to put Iran’s Revolutionary Guards Corps on its terror list. “This is an extremely wrong decision,” he said, adding that the listing of foreign national armies as terror groups would lead to dire cracks in the international system and law order.

11THURSDAY 18 APRIL 2019 ASIA

95 LS constituencies go to polls today IANS NEW DELHI

As 95 Lok Sabha constituencies go to the polls in the second phase of elections today, AIADMK has the maximum number of 35 seats to defend, followed by the BJP, which has 26 at stake.

In the second phase, which will cover 11 states and one union territory, Congress has 11 seats at stake while Shiv Sena has to defend 4, BJD 3, RJD, JD(S) 2 each, CPI(M), JD(U), TMC, NCP, National Conference, AIUDF, PMK and AINRC one each.

Of the 95 seats going to polls today, 38 are in Tamil Nadu, 14 in Karnataka, 10 in Maharashtra, 8 in Uttar Pradesh, five each in Assam, Bihar and Odisha, three each in West Bengal and Chhat-tisgarh, two in Jammu and Kashmir, one each in Manipur, and Puducherry.

The first phase on April 11

saw voting in 91 constituencies spread across 20 states. In Tamil Nadu, where all the 38 Lok Sabha seats will see balloting today, it is the first major election without the stalwarts and former Chief Ministers - late AIADMK leader J Jayalaithaa and late DMK leader M Karunanidhi.

The 2014 Lok Sabha elections in the state were swept by the AIDMK under Jayalalithaa’s lead-ership, winning 37 of the total 39 seats. In the by polls later, the party lost one seat and now has 36 seats to defend in a changed political situation after Jayala-lithaa’s death.

The party faces a strong chal-lenge from the DMK-led alliance.

The BJP, which had won one seat in the state in the last

elections, is trying to emerge as a player in the southern state. It has sought to forge a “formidable alliance” led by AIADMK and is contesting five seats in the state.

Actor-turned-politician Kamal Haasan’s party Makkal Needhi Maiam (MNM) is also in the fray for the first time.

Congress, which drew a blank in 2014, is contesting nine seats as part of the front led by DMK. After Tamil Nadu, the biggest chunk of 14 seats going to polls tomorrow is Karnataka. In the state, key constituencies to be watched out for include Tumkur from where former Prime Minister HD Deve Gowda is in the fray. He has left his tra-ditional Hasaan seat for his grandson Prajwal Revanna,

where BJP has fielded A Madhu. The Congress, which used to be a strong rival of JD-S in southern Karnataka, is now its ally. In the last elections, the BJP had won six of the 14 seats going to the polls in the second phase.

In Maharashtra, where polling will be held in 10 seats tomorrow, the ruling BJP and

Shiv Sena will have to defend four seats each, which they won last time.

This time, the NCP-Congress combine is giving them a tough fight by highlighting issues like farmers’ distress and unem-ployment. Eight seats of politi-cally-crucial Uttar Pradesh will also go the polls in the second

phase. Of the total 80 seats, bal-loting has already been held on eight seats in the first phase in the state. The BJP, which had won all the eight seats in the last elections, this time has to face a formidable challenge from the coalition of Samajwadi Party, Bahujan Samaj Party and Rash-triya Lok Dal.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi addressing his supporters during an election campaign rally in Himmatnagar, Gujarat, yesterday

Debt-stricken Jet Airways suspends all operationsAFP MUMBAI

India’s debt-stricken Jet Airways halted all of its operations yesterday after failing to secure emergency funding from lenders, leaving it teetering on the edge of bankruptcy.

“Jet Airways is compelled to cancel all its international and domestic flights. The last flight will operate today,” it said in statement.

Jet had asked a consortium of lenders led by the State Bank of India to urgently provide four billion rupees ($57.5m) but said that this had not been forthcoming.

“This has been a very difficult decision but without interim funding, the airline is simply unable to conduct flight opera-tions in a manner that delivers to the very reasonable expecta-tions of its guests, employees,

partners and service providers,” it added.

The airline was once India’s second-biggest by market share but is on the brink of collapse with debts of more than $1bn.

Jet was operating just five

planes yesterday because it could not pay its bills, down from a fleet of more than 120 at its peak.

The carrier has cancelled hundreds of flights in recent weeks, stranding thousands of passengers.

It has repeatedly defaulted on loans and failed to pay staff in recent months.

The consortium took control of Jet in March, pledging to give $218m in “immediate funding support” as part of a debt reso-lution plan.

But they have failed to release most of the money and the banks also failed to agree how to proceed after a meeting of several hours on Monday.

The SBI-led consortium is looking for a buyer for Jet and a deadline passed on Friday for prospective bidders to express an interest in acquiring a 75 percent stake in the carrier.

The SBI is yet to announce a shortlist of prospective bidders but Indian media said four were in the running including Etihad Airways, which already owns a 24 percent stake.

“Jet Airways will now await the bid finalisation process by

SBI and the consortium of Indian Lenders,” the airline said, adding that it hoped to resume services “as soon as possible”.

A collapse of Jet, and the loss of more than 20,000 jobs, would deal a blow to Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s pro-business reputation as he seeks a second term in ongoing national elections.

Jet CEO Vinay Dube paid tribute to staff in an email to employees and said the airline “must be given another chance” to fly.

But analysts said buyers would be reluctant to buy a grounded airline that had lost most of its airport slots.

“Is someone willing to take the risk to give this comatose body an electric jolt? I don’t see it happening. At best it might come back in a smaller role,” said Devesh Agarwal, editor of Ban-galore Aviation.

Passengers stand at the Jet Airways counter to find the status of their flights, at the international airport in Mumbai, yesterday.

Myanmar frees over 9,000 prisoners in New Year amnestyREUTERS YANGON

Myanmar began releasing more than 9,000 prisoners yesterday, with many drug offenders among the first to walk free, but just two political detainees, after the President declared an amnesty on the first day of the traditional New Year.

President Win Myint said 9,535 local prisoners, and 16 for-eigners, had been pardoned in a gesture designed “for the peace and pleasure of the people, and taking into consideration humanitarian concerns”.

Authorities were scrutinising who should be pardoned among the rest, he said in a statement on his Facebook page, without elaborating.

Myanmar regularly orders such releases from its

overcrowded prisons to mark the holiday.

Dozens of people waited in sweltering heat for hours at the gates of Insein prison, the

colonial-era jail on the outskirts of the commercial capital of Yangon, hoping their relatives would be among those pardoned. Under the setting sun, prisoners

began to trickle through the gates as crowds cheered and waved green Eugenia leaves, symbols of good fortune.

Many of those released said they had been convicted on drugs charges, some receiving long sentences for possession of small quantities of banned substances.

“There are too many people who should be released inside the prison,” said 33-year-old Paik Paik, who said she served four years of a seven-year sen-tence, some of them spent breaking rocks at a labour camp separated from her children, after she was arrested with two methamphetamine pills.

“The punishment does not fit the crime,” she added.

Two Reuters reporters jailed for breaking the Official Secrets Act were not among those being

pardoned, a senior official at Insein, where they are being held, said.

Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy party came to power in 2016 promising to free political prisoners from jails across the country, but activists say they continue to be imprisoned.

In the past week, a film-maker accused of defaming the military was denied bail and sent to Insein, while several satirical poets were charged with online defamation for broadcasting a New Year performance critical of the army.

Two political prisoners, of a total of 364, were released yes-terday, said Aung Myo Kyaw of a human rights group, the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners.

Prisoners being transported out of Insein prison to mark Myanmar’s New Year amnesty, in Yangon, Myanmar, yesterday.

EC bars NaMoTV telecast during ‘silenceperiod’IANS NEW DELHI

Cracking the whip on NaMo TV, the Election Commission (EC) yesterday ruled that the BJP-sponsored channel cannot telecast political programmes in poll-going constituencies during the “silence period” in any phase of the ongoing elec-tions, sources said.

The poll panel also asked Delhi’s Chief Electoral Officer - who is the nodal officer to pre-certify political content on pan-India TV channels - to ensure that its directions are followed.

The decision came a week after the EC ruled that since the content being aired on NaMo TV - a channel dedicated to Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s rallies and speeches - was not certified, it should immediately stop telecast.

However, the new order means that the channel cannot air any political content during the silence period - the 48 hours before the conclusion of voting.

“As NaMo TV/Content TV is sponsored by a political party, all recorded pro-grammes of political content displayed on the channel/platform would be covered under the purview of the Com-mission’s Order... Accordingly all recorded programmes with political content are manda-torily required to be pre-cer-tified by the MCMC (Media Cer-tification and Monitoring Com-mittee) before telecasting,” the EC earlier said.

Seek a ‘forever’ relation with Wayanad: RahulIANS WAYANAD

Reaching out to the people in Kerala’s Wayanad, Congress President Rahul Gandhi yesterday assured them he will be with them forever.

In his first visit to the Wayanad Lok Sabha constit-uency after April 4 when he came along with his sister Pri-yanka Gandhi to file his nomi-nation, he earlier made a quick visit to the famed temple of Lord Vishnu at Thiruneli where he performed “beli tharpanam” in memory of his father, former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi.

Gandhi had on his previous visit to Kerala expressed his wish to visit the temple and perform the puja, but the Special Protection Group (SPG), however, did not allow it due to security reasons, former Chief Minister Oommen Chandy said.

Gandhi walked to the temple from the Devasom Guest house in Thiruneli and later walked some 700 metres to the spot where his father’s ashes was immersed on May 30, 1991.

The Congress President then addressed three political rallies. “I stand here not as a politician, but as a son, brother and a friend. I decided to contest from here so as to project that south India is as important as other places. I seek a relation with Wayanad that will be there forever,” said Gandhi to a huge round of applause at Sultan Battery.

50 dead, scores hurt in rain, thunderstormIANS NEW DELHI

As many as 50 people were reportedly killed and scores others injured in thunderstorms, hail and dust-storm and rain that lashed Madhya Pradesh, Mahar-ashtra, Gujarat, Rajasthan, Punjab and Haryana since Tuesday evening.

Maximum number of deaths were reported from Rajasthan where 25 people were reported to have lost their lives in a severe thunderstorm that struck the state.

Active western disturbance over eastern Iran and neigh-bourhood had been moving

eastward since Monday, which caused cyclonic circulation over southwest Rajasthan and its neighbourhood at lower tropo-spheric levels, said the Met department.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has announced an ex gratia of Rs2 lakh each from the Prime Minister’s National Relief Fund for the families of those who died in the natural calamity.

Rajasthan Relief and Disaster Management Secretary Ashutosh AT Pednekar said five people died in Udaipur, four each in Jhalawad and Jaipur, two each in Bundi, Jalore and Rajsamand, and one each in Baran, Bhilwara, Alwar, Hanumangarh, Pali and

Pratapgarh districts.Winds blowing at 60kmph

blew away roofs of many houses and uprooted trees and electric poles in many parts of the state, officials said.

Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot has announced Rs4 lakh ex gratia for the families of deceased.

In Madhya Pradesh, 15 people died in the untimely rain and accompanying lightning on Tuesday evening. “Three persons each died in Indore, Dhar and Shajapur, two in Ratlam, and one each in Chhindwara, Rajgarh, Sehore and Alirajpur areas,” an official statement said.

Officials said pouring rain

damaged properties in Bhopal, Indore, Dhar, Shajapur, Sehore, Ujjain, Ratlam, Khargone, Badwani, Chhindwara, Alirajpur and Rajgarh areas.

Extensive damage to crops has also been reported from many parts of the state. Expressing grief over the deaths, Chief Minister Kamal Nath in a tweet assured all support to the affected families and farmers whose crop has been destroyed in the hailstorm.

In Maharashtra, 11 people were killed over the past 72 hours, besides four others last week, in thunderstorms accom-panied by lightning and rain, officials said.

Polling will be held in states of Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Maharashtra, UP, Assam, Bihar, Odisha, West Bengal, Chhattisgarh, J&K, Manipur and in the Union Territory of Puducherry.

12 THURSDAY 18 APRIL 2019ASIA

39 die in rains, flash floods across PakistanAGENCIES KARACHI

Torrential rains followed by flash floods have killed 39 and injured dozens in the last two days across Pakistan, officials and local media reported yesterday.

According to the National Disaster Management Authority, a state-run agency that coordi-nates between different relief and rescue organisations, most of the deaths have been reported from northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) and south-western Balochistan provinces, which have been in the grip of massive rains caused by a westerly system which entered from neighbouring Iran.

In addition to the human loss, some 80 houses have been completely or partially damaged in the two provinces, the authority said.

Heavy rains caused flash floods in parts of KP and Balo-chistan forcing hundreds of res-idents to move to safer places, while several cities of north-eastern Punjab province also received heavy downpour, local broadcaster Geo News reported.

Footage aired on television showed several vehicles trapped in waist-deep water as rescue workers backed by army troops help them in parts of Balochistan.

The unseasonal rains flanked by gusty winds also downed trees, electricity poles and signboards in several cities.

Most of deaths were due to r o o f c o l l a p s e a n d electrocution.

The meteorological department has forecast more rains in the next 24 to 48 hours across the country.

The rains and storms have damaged up to 150,000 tons of standing mature wheat crop in the Punjab province, an official

estimate showed on Tuesday.The damage to standing

wheat crop has also been esti-mated due to lodging (bending) of plants over a vast area, an initial assessment prepared by Provincial Agricul ture Department said. Wheat has been cultivated over 16.165 million acres in Punjab during Rabi 2018-19 and production target has been set at 19.5m tons. However, now mature crop of wheat may reduce by 50,000 tons due to adverse impact of inclement weather.

Severe weather events have been reported in southern and central Punjab. The worst affected districts, according to official estimate, are Rahim Yar Khan, Rajanpur, Dera Ghazi Khan, Muzaffargarh, Baha-walpur, Bahawalnagar, Multan, Khanewal, Vehari, Faisalabad, Jhang, Toba Tek Singh, Chiniot, and Chakwal. The losses to standing or harvested wheat crop from hailstorm are however not more than one per cent of respective districts.

As per an assessment, in Rajanpur and Dera Ghazi Khan districts, the hill torrents have damaged wheat crop over 8000 acres, which is stated to be 15 percent of the region.

As per weather forecast, more widespread dust-thunder-storm/rain accompanied by gusty winds is expected in Punjab, Islamabad, Kashmir, and in scattered areas in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, while at isolated places in Quetta, Zhob, Sibbi, Kalat, Sukkur, Larkana divisions and Gilgit Baltistan.

Indonesia’s Widodo set for second term as President AP JAKARTA

Indonesian President Joko Widodo has won a second five-year term, preliminary election results showed yesterday, in a victory for moderation over the nationalistic rhetoric of his rival, Prabowo Subianto.

Vote counts from five inde-pendent survey groups showed Widodo with a clear lead over Subianto, a general during the era of the Suharto military dic-tatorship who warned Indonesia would fall apart without his strongman leadership.

The so-called “quick counts” from reputable survey organi-sations that use a sample of polling stations have been reliable in past elections. With an average of 80% of sample polling stations counted, the five survey organisations showed Widodo winning 54-56% of the vote, a modest improvement on his 2014 showing.

Indonesia, the world’s most populous Muslim-majority nation, is an outpost of democracy in a Southeast Asian

neighbourhood of authoritarian governments and is forecast to be among the world’s biggest economies by 2030. A second term for Widodo, the first Indo-nesian president from outside the Jakarta elite, could further cement the country’s two decades of democratisation.

Addressing jubilant sup-porters a few hours after polls closed, Widodo said he was aware of his lead and called for the nation to reunite after the divisions of the campaign.

“From the indications of the exit poll and also the quick counts, we can see it all, but we must be patient to wait for the official counting from the Election Commission,” he said.

Subianto, who also lost to Widodo in the 2014 presidential election, had not yet conceded defeat. He said his campaign’s exit poll and quick count showed that he had won but urged his supporters not to cause chaos.

His campaign team has alleged massive voter list irreg-ularities, but analysts say the claims are absurd and designed to undermine the election.

The balloting was a huge logistical exercise with 193 million people eligible to vote, more than 800,000 polling sta-tions and 17 million people involved in ensuring the polls ran smoothly. Helicopters, boats and horses were used to get ballots to remote and inacces-sible corners of the archipelago.

Conservative opponents had tried to discredit Widodo, a fur-niture exporter whose political career started as a small city mayor, as insufficiently Islamic.

Widodo tried to neutralise the not-a-real-Muslim whispers with the selection of Ma’ruf Amin, the leading Islamic cleric in Indonesia, as his running mate, though he risked alien-ating progressive and moderate supporters.

Pre-election polls consist-ently gave a lead of as much as 20 percentage points to Widodo.

After the results became clear, hundreds of Widodo sup-porters marched through downtown Jakarta, some holding aloft a giant red and white Indo-nesian flag.

Indonesian President Joko Widodo, his vice-presidential candidate Maruf Amin and coalition party leaders hold a press conference after the country’s general election, in Jakarta yesterday.

Taliban deridesKabul plan to send250 delegatesAFP KABUL

An upcoming conference between Afghan representatives and the Taliban appeared to be in trouble yesterday even before it begins, with the militants deriding Kabul’s plan to send 250 delegates - several of whom have already dropped out.

President Ashraf Ghani’s administration had announced on Tuesday a list of people from all walks of Afghan life, including some from the government, that it wants to send to the so-called intra-Afghan dialogue in Doha this weekend.

But the Taliban poured scorn on the lengthy list, saying it was not “normal” and that they had “no plans” to meet with so many people.

“The creators of (the) Kabul list must realise that this is an orderly and prearranged

conference in a far-away Khaleeji (Gulf) country and not an invi-tation to some wedding or other party at a hotel in Kabul,” Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said in a statement.

The Taliban - who see Ghani as a US stooge and his gov-ernment as a puppet regime - also continue to insist they will not be negotiating with Kabul at the conference, and any admin-istration officials are involved merely in a “personal capacity”.

Further doubts were cast when some of those Ghani said would attend the conference announced they would not go.

Ghani’s own running mate Amrullah Saleh, the former head of Afghan intelligence and a longtime Taliban critic, was among them.

The Taliban “should agree to direct & focused negotiations with the Afghan government”, he tweeted.

Atta Mohammad Noor, a key opposition figure and former governor of Balkh province, had also been included on the list, which was meant as an inclusive representation of Afghan society.

But Noor slammed the del-egation as politically biased toward Ghani.

“We won’t be attending the talks with this running order,” Noor tweeted yesterday, adding he viewed the list as Ghani’s

“intentional act to sabotage the peace efforts”.

A senior Taliban commander said that the mammoth dele-gation showed the “Americans and their puppet Afghan gov-ernment are not serious about the peaceful settlement of the issue”. Ghani met with the dele-gates yesterday, giving no indi-cation of any trouble, saying:

“We and the Afghan nation expect you to return home suc-cessfully and proudly from

meeting with the Taliban in Qatar.” The US has been holding separate bilateral peace negoti-ations with the Taliban as part of a months-long peace push led by Washington.

The intra-Afghan dialogue comes as part of the effort, but the US is not believed to be attending. The developments come as fresh violence rips across Afghanistan with the Taliban launching their so-called spring offensive.

New Zealand disarms police as terror threat level loweredAFP WELLINGTON

New Zealand police yesterday ended the routine arming of frontline officers as the terrorism threat level was lowered a month after the Christchurch mosques massacre.

Police and security agencies reduced the threat level from high to medium, meaning authorities judge that another attack, violent criminal behaviour, or violent protest remains “feasible” rather than “very likely”.

The level is still higher than it was before the March 15 attacks, when the threat was deemed to be “low”.

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said “there is no current specific threat”, but the security agencies believed the medium level “accurately reflects our current status”.

Frontline New Zealand police have historically not carried firearms and many people were shocked to see them heavily armed after 50 Muslims were gunned down while at Friday prayers.

Police commissioner Mike Bush said with the easing of the security threat level, the police had reassessed their position on arming frontline staff and the carrying of weapons would now be decided on a case-by-case basis.

The decision was made after “significant consultation” with mosques and Islamic Centres in relation to ongoing security.

Afghanistan’s President Ashraf Ghani meeting with Afghan delegations at the Presidential Palace in Kabul yesterday, ahead of the scheduled talks with the Taliban.

Malaysia begins inquiry into 2015 discovery of mass gravesREUTERS KUALA LUMPUR

Malaysia yesterday began a public inquiry into the discovery of mass graves and suspected human traf-ficking camps in the jungles near its border with Thailand, which prompted a regional crisis in 2015, and accusations over obstruction of justice.

The dense jungles of southern

Thailand and northern Malaysia have been a major stop-off point for smugglers bringing people to Southeast Asia by boat from Myanmar, most of them Rohingya Muslims who say they are fleeing persecution, and Bangladesh.

In January, the government had said it would set up a panel to inquire into claims that author-ities mishandled an investigation into 139 mass graves and more

than 12 campsites suspected to have been run by migrant-smug-gling gangs.

Three police from a jungle infantry unit described finding the first of the campsites in January 2015, during a patrol in a heav-ily-forested region on the Malaysian side of the border.

The officials found an area filled with tents and structures made of wooden sticks, some as

high as two storeys, said one of them, Mat Ten. “These makeshift houses were surrounded by barbed wire and there were people living inside,” he told the panel.

The men’s testimony con-firmed media reports and rights groups’ statements that author-ities had known about the camps four months before going public in May 2015. In a report last

month, the Malaysian Human Rights Commission and rights group Fortify Rights said author-ities had destroyed one of the camps a day after its discovery, wiping out evidence that could h a v e a i d e d p o l i c e investigations.

The human rights com-mission was set up by Malaysia’s parliament but the government is not bound by its findings.

Heavy rains caused flash floods in parts of KP and Balochistan forcing hundreds of residents to move to safer places.

Imran to visit China next week, sign new pactsREUTERS ISLAMABAD

Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan will visit China next week to meet its leaders and deliver a keynote speech at the vast Belt and Road Forum in Beijing, Pakistan’s Foreign Ministry said yesterday, as economic anxiety grows at home.

China has pledged about $60 billion in infrastructure loans for Pakistan, touted as a success story of its Belt and Road initiative, which aims to build road and maritime trading routes across the globe.

But Pakistan’s economy has hit serious turbulence over the past year and Islamabad is now finalising a bailout package with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) to stave off a balance of payments crisis, despite more than $10 billion in short-term loans from allies such as China and Saudi Arabia.

Imran will visit China from April 25, and give a keynote speech at the three-day Belt and Road Forum that starts the following day. The high-profile gathering is one of China’s biggest annual state events.

“In addition to participating in the Belt and Road Forum, the Prime Minister would also hold bilateral meetings with Pres-ident Xi Jinping and Premier Li Keqiang,” the Ministry said in a statement.

The two countries will sign several pacts to enhance coop-eration, and Imran will meet corporate and business leaders, it added.

The Prime Minister’s visit to Pakistan’s all-weather friend China comes as his government, in power since August, faces a deepening economic crisis, with a ballooning current account deficit and fast-depleting foreign reserves.

The long-delayed rescue package would be Pakistan’s 13th IMF bailout programme since the late 1980s.

13THURSDAY 18 APRIL 2019 EUROPE

France launches global contest to replace Notre-Dame spireAFP PARIS

France yesterday announced it would invite architects from around the world to submit designs for replacing the spire of Notre-Dame cathedral after a devastating blaze, as the government braced for a mammoth restoration challenge.

Prime Minister Edouard Philippe said the contest would decide whether the monument should have a new spire at all and if so, whether it should be identical to the fallen 19th-century model or be a wholly new design.

The world looked on in horror on Monday as flames engulfed the 850-year-old Gothic masterpiece seen as encapsulating the soul of Paris and the spire came crashing down.

Explaining that having no new spire at all was an option, Philippe noted that Notre-Dame had been without a steeple for part of its history.

“The international contest will settle the question of whether we should build a new spire, whether we should rebuild the spire that was designed and built by (Eugene) Viollet-Le-Duc, in identical fashion, or whether we should... endow Notre-Dame cathedral with a new spire adapted to the techniques and the challenges of our era.” Philippe described the task of

rebuilding it as “a huge challenge and historic responsibility”, a day after President Emmanuel Macron said the entire resto-ration should be completed in just five years.

The bells of French cathe-drals were to ring out at 1650 GMT yesterday to mark the exact moment when the fire started on Monday.

Macron had vowed to rebuild the iconic monument, the real star of Victor Hugo’s “Hunchback of Notre Dame” by 2024 when France hosts the summer Olympics.

“We can do it,” he said on Tuesday, calling France “a nation of builders.” Yesterday afternoon, he was set to chair a meeting of senior government, church, conservation and Paris city officials to launch the recon-struction process.

No sooner had firefighters extinguished the flames than pledges of donations towards restoring France’s best-loved monument, which attracted 12 million visitors in 2018, began to pour in.

Within 24 hours, the pledges had reached more than 800m

euros ($900m), with French business magnates and corpo-rations jostling to outshine each other with displays of generosity.

But the slew of announce-ments raised eyebrows in France, with some leftist politi-cians arguing that the ultra-rich could best help protect the coun-try’s cultural heritage by fully paying their taxes - or helping the “human cathedral” of people in need.

The huge tax breaks available on the donations also caused some unease, prompting Francois-Henri Pinault, the bil-lionaire CEO of the Kering luxury goods empire, to announce he would forfeit his rebate.

“The donation for Notre-Dame of Paris will not be the object of any tax deduction. Indeed, the Pinault family con-siders that it is out of the question to make French tax-payers shoulder the burden,” Pinault said in a statement.

Pinault had led the pledges of donations starting Monday night with a promise of 100m euros.

Billionaire Bernard Arnault and his LVMH luxury conglom-erate, Total oil company and cosmetics giant L’Oreal also each pledged 100m euros or more, while US tech giant Apple said it would give an unspecified amount. French corporations are eligible for a 60-percent tax rebate on cultural donations.

People looking at Notre-Dame de Paris Cathedral from the bank of the river Seine yesterday, in the aftermath of a fire that devastated the cathedral.

Rooster statue found ‘battered’ in debrisAFP PARIS

A wrought copper statue of a rooster that sat atop Notre-Dame has been found “battered” in the debris of the Paris cathedral following its devas-tating fire, France’s Culture Ministry said.

The statue is considered all the more important because it contains three holy relics - including a fragment of the Crown of Thorns believed by

Christians to have been worn by Jesus Christ during his cruci-fixion, placed there to protect Parisians.

The sculpture of the bird - which is an unofficial symbol of France - was recovered on Tuesday by a restorer picking through the rubble, a Ministry spokesman said.

The head of the French Builders Federation, Jacques Chanut, posted a picture of the restorer holding a green-col-oured rooster statue in the street.

The Ministry spokesman said the statue had been handed over to religious officials, without elaborating.

A Ministry official separately told Le Parisien newspaper that the statue was “battered but apparently restorable”.

The official was quoted saying that, when the 19th-century spire had collapsed into the cathedral, the rooster statue had detached “and fallen on the good side... away from the seat of the fire”.

Portugal’s energy crisis worsens as fuel-tanker strike dragsREUTERS LISBON

Energy shortages in Portugal sharpened yesterday as a strike by fuel-tanker drivers entered its third day in the worst indus-trial unrest of the Socialist government’s four-year rule.

Panicked motorists formed long lines at petrol stations, some crossing into Spain to refuel, while at airports reserves reached critically low levels in the run-up to the tourism-dependent economy’s busy Easter season.

Prime Minister Antonio Costa’s government on Tuesday ordered striking drivers to supply

essential services such as hos-pitals and airports, and to provide a minimum amount to

fuel stations - but the decree did not seem to be fully heeded.

“The government will do everything to overcome the con-flict,” Costa, whom the oppo-sition accuses of mishandling the crisis, told parliament.

Crowd-sourced emergency services platform VOST Portugal said that more than 2,000 petrol stations were running on reduced fuel supplies - up from around 200 on Tuesday.

The drivers’ union said on Wednesday the strike would continue until the government moves to resolve workers’ demands for better pay and con-ditions from employers.

“This political war will only

harm people,” taxi driver Antonio Santos said in Lisbon. “It affects everyone. There are taxi drivers unable to work. I had to spend almost two hours at a petrol station to refuel.” The strike follows a wave of disputes in a nation that had been lauded by European institutions as an economic model, implementing painful austerity measures after the global financial crisis a decade ago to underpin recovery.

Costa’s minority Socialist government, backed in par-liament by the Left Bloc and the Communists, faces a general election in October this year. Though expected to win, the Socialists may struggle to win

enough seats to form a majority.Unrest is growing, as health

and education workers also complain about low wages, threatening to undermine the government’s vote-winning rep-utation as good economic stewards.

Economist Filipe Garcia, of consultancy firm Informacao de Mercados Financeiros, said 90 percent of freight transport in Portugal was by road meaning a prolonged strike could have a major impact on an economy expected to grow 1.9 percent this year. After at least one flight was called off on Tuesday, there were no reports of additional cancel-lations yesterday.

Swedish soldiers load an anti-tank weapon on a range during a live fire exercise on the Baltic Island. Following the conflict in Ukraine, Sweden has scrambled to beef up a military that was cut back after the end of the Cold War.

Suspect planning attack held in Morocco: SpainAFP MADRID

Police have arrested a suspect in Morocco allegedly preparing a terrorist attack on Seville, the southern Spanish city known for its Holy Week processions, Spain’s Interior Ministry said yesterday.

The intelligence and police services of the two countries conducted an anti-terrorist operation that ended in the arrest of the “alleged jihadist,” said the statement. The Ministry refused to say whether the suspect intended to carry out the attack this week, during the world-famous processions that attract hundreds of thousands of visitors.

Spanish police were searching his home in Seville yesterday afternoon. Spain is on level-four terror alert out of a maximum of five.

The country has twice been struck by major militant attacks. In what is still Europe’s deadliest in March 2004, bombs exploded on commuter trains in Madrid, killing 191 people in an attack claimed by Al Qaeda-inspired extremists. Then in August 2017, a double attack left 16 dead in Barcelona and the seaside resort of Cambrils.

Czech police say PM Babis should stand trial in fraud caseREUTERS PRAGUE

Czech police said yesterday that Prime Minister Andrej Babis and others should stand trial for alleged fraud involving the handling of a 2m euro European Union subsidy - charges that could see him jailed for up to 10 years.

Babis, a billionaire media and chemicals entrepreneur, has repeatedly denied wrongdoing and told the state CTK news agency on Wednesday that the

case was part of a political plot against him. “It has been politi-cised,” he said.

His junior coalition partners - the centre-left Social Demo-crats who have threatened to pull out of the government in the past over the accusations - said that they would wait for the state attorney’s decision.

“The investigation by the police has been concluded and... there is a recommendation to indict all those charged by the police,” the spokesman for the Prague district state attorney’s

office said. Babis was among those charged, the spokesman added. In the Czech legal system, police bring initial charges. They then investigate and present findings to a state attorney who decides whether to go to court, ask police to investigate further, or halt the proceedings.

Thousands of opposition supporters and other activists have taken to the streets pro-testing against Babis since the charges emerged in 2017.

But the case has not dented Babis’ overall popularity ahead

of the European Parliament elec-tions in May. His centrist ANO party, a member of that parlia-ment’s ALDE faction, leads in polls with a double-digit margin.

Elections for the Czech par-liament are not due until 2021.

Police have said they are looking into accusations that Babis hid his ownership of a farm and conference centre so that it could qualify for an EU subsidy meant for small businesses.

Babis has said it was owned by his family members when the subsidy was awarded.

France to try Assad’s uncle on graft chargesAFP PARIS

The uncle of Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad is to stand trial in France on charges of building up a big property empire in the country using funds from Syrian state coffers, legal sources said yesterday.

An investigating magistrate ordered Rifaat al-Assad to stand trial for organised money laun-dering in building the 90m euro ($102m) property portfolio in France, according to the order for the trial seen by AFP. Its date has yet to be set.

Rifaat al-Assad has been under investigation in France since 2014.

In a written decision dated March 8, the office of the financial crimes prosecutor called for Assad to stand trial for laundering the proceeds of

aggravated tax fraud, embez-zling Syrian state funds, and failing to register French security and cleaning staff.

Assad, who splits his time between France and Britain, denies the charges. Formerly Syria’s Vice-President, Rifaat Assad left Syria in 1984 after mounting a failed coup against his brother Hafez al-Assad, Bashar’s father who led Syria from 1971 to 2000.

After he arrived in Europe, his lavish lifestyle, four wives, and 16 children soon raised eyebrows.

His reported French fortune includes two Paris townhouses, one measuring a vast 3,000 square metres, as well as a stud farm and a chateau near the French capital, and 7,300 square metres of office space in Lyon.

He and his family also own over 500 properties in Spain.

A closed gas station in Seixal, on the outskirts of Lisbon, yesterday.

Germany arrests suspected IS memberAP BERLIN

German authorities yesterday arrested a man suspected of joining the Islamic State group in Syria and later helping send another new recruit for IS from Germany to Syria.

Federal prosecutors said the 28-year-old German national, identified only as Volkan L. in line with German privacy rules, was arrested in Hamburg. He is suspected of membership in a foreign terrorist organisation.

Prosecutors said that he travelled to Syria in November 2013 to join IS and underwent military training. They say he returned to Germany in March 2014 and turned his attention to finding new recruits.

He is accused of helping organize travel to Syria for one such person in summer 2014, acting as a go-between between the recruit and an IS member in Syria.

In a separate case, prose-cutors said later Wednesday that they have indicted a 47-year-old German woman arrested in October as she attempted to return to the country after allegedly mar-rying an IS fighter and living in an Iraqi home seized by the extremist group.

The suspect, identified as Mine K., faces charges in a Duesseldorf court of mem-bership in a foreign terrorist organization and having appro-priated opponents’ property in violation of international law.

President Emmanuel Macron has vowed to rebuild the iconic monument by 2024 when France hosts the summer Olympics.

Sweden returns troops to Baltic Island

14 THURSDAY 18 APRIL 2019AMERICAS

Peru’s Garcia dies after shooting himself

REUTERS LIMA

Peru’s former president Alan Garcia died in a hospital in Lima yesterday, hours after shooting himself in the head to avoid arrest in connection with a bribery probe, authorities said.

Garcia, who had six adult children, was 69.

A skilled orator elected pres-ident twice, first as a firebrand leftist and then as a champion of foreign investment and free trade, Garcia had been dogged by allegations of corruption in recent years that he had repeatedly denied.

Garcia was one of nine people a judge had ordered to be arrested yesterday for alleged involvement in bribes distributed by Odebrecht, a Brazilian con-struction company that triggered

Latin America’s biggest graft scandal when it admitted in 2016 that it had paid kickbacks to pol-iticians across the region to secure lucrative contracts.

While three former presi-dents in Peru have also been ordered to jail in connection with Odebrecht, Garcia had blamed his legal troubles on political persecution, accusing President Martin Vizcarra without evidence of trying to silence him.

“Others might sell out, not me,” Garcia said in some of his last broadcast comments on

Tuesday, repeating a phrase he has used frequently as his political foes became ensnared in the Odebrecht investigation.

Members of his once-pow-erful Apra party announced his death to crowds gathered outside of hospital Casimiro Ulloa, where he suffered three cardiac arrests and underwent emergency surgery. “Apra never dies!” his supporters chanted to news cameras as police in riot gear stood by. Vizcarra’s gov-ernment ordered flags to be flown at half mast. “I’m dis-mayed by the death of former

president Alan Garcia,” Vizcarra said on Twitter. “I send my con-dolences to his family and loved ones.”

Garcia’s death shocked the Andean country that had watched him become one of the world’s youngest presidents when elected at 36 in 1985, a term that was marked by a severe economic crisis and the rise of leftist rebel groups. He was elected to another five-year term in 2006 after remaking himself as a free-market proponent.

Interior Minister Carlos

Moran said at a news conference shortly before Garcia died that the former president had told police he needed to call his attorney after they arrived at his home to arrest him.

“He entered his room and closed the door behind him,” Moran said. “Within a few minutes, a shot from a firearm was heard, and police forcibly entered the room and found Mr. Garcia sitting with a wound in his head.” Last year, Garcia asked Uruguay for political asylum after he was banned from leaving the country to

keep him from fleeing or obstructing the investigation. Uruguay rejected the request.

Garcia would have been the third former president in Peru to have been jailed in the Ode-brecht case. Ollanta Humala spent nine months in pre-trial detention in 2017-2018 and Pedro Pablo Kuczynski was arrested without charges last week. A fourth former president, Alejandro Toledo, is fighting extradition from California after a judge in Peru ordered him jailed for 18 months in con-nection with Odebrecht in 2017.

A file picture shows Peru’s Presidential candidate Alan Garcia smiling during a press conference in Lima, Peru.

Supporter of Peru’s former president Alan Garcia react outside the Casimiro Ulloa Emergency Hospital in Lima, yesterday.

Garcia was one of nine people a judge had ordered to be arrested yesterday for alleged involvement in bribes distributed by Odebrecht.

Cuba rejects US move against foreign investorsAFP HAVANA

Cuba yesterday rejected Wash-ington’s decision to allow lawsuits in US courts against companies operating in prop-erties seized during the communist revolution in Havana, calling it an “attack.” “It is an attack against International Law and the sovereignty of

#Cuba & third States,” Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez wrote on Twitter.

On Tuesday, President Donald Trump’s administration defied warnings from the European Union by forging ahead with the long-delayed Helms-Burton Act, saying it would go into effect on May 2.

“Any person or company doing business in Cuba should

heed this announcement,” Sec-retary of State Mike Pompeo said. The measure was originally passed by the US Congress in 1996 but until now had been delayed systematically by each president every six months.

The EU has threatened to hit the US with reprisals over the move, according to a letter from foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini and trade

commissioner Cecilia Malm-strom to Pompeo.

Under the provision of the Helms-Burton Act, companies that operate in property seized by Cuba during or after Fidel Castro’s 1959 communist revo-lution could face lawsuits in US courts from the vast and politi-cally powerful Cuban American diaspora. “Those doing business in Cuba should fully investigate

whether they are connected to property stolen in service of a failed communist experiment,” Pompeo said.

In its letter, the EU said it would be “obliged to use all means at its disposal... to protect its interests.” The EU is worried about how the move will affect its companies in Cuba — it is the island nation’s largest foreign investor.

Teen ‘infatuated’ withColumbine massacrefound dead in ColoradoREUTERS DENVER

A Florida teenager believed to be armed and “infatuated” with the Columbine massacre was found dead by authorities in Colorado after she travelled to the state days before the 20th anniversary of the school attack, according to CNN and other media reports.

Sol Pais, identified as an 18-year-old woman from Surfside, Florida, who author-ities called “extremely dan-gerous,” was found in Clear Creek County, a local CBS affiliate reported. CNN, citing law enforcement sources, reported that she was dead when authorities found her.

Pais was “no longer a threat to the community,” Patricia Bill-inger, a spokeswoman for Colo-rado’s Public Safety Department told Reuters. She declined to elaborate.

Clear Creek County is about 40 miles west of Columbine High School, where two teenaged male students shot and killed 12 classmates and a

teacher on April 20, 1999, before committing suicide.

Area schools were closed yesterday as FBI agents, Jef-ferson County deputies and Colorado state troopers searched for Pais.

Pais flew from Miami to Denver on Monday, where she bought a pump-action shotgun and ammunition, FBI Special Agent in Charge Dean Phillips said at a news conference late on Tuesday. Denver is adjacent to Jefferson County.

Some 20 to 30 officers were searching for her near the Echo Lake Campground in the Arapaho National Forest yes-terday morning, CBS4 in Denver reported.

A spokeswoman for the Miami-Dade County Public Schools said that Pais was student at Miami Beach Senior High School and that there was no threat to schools within the district. On Tuesday, an FBI bul-letin said authorities lacked probable cause for a formal arrest but that law enforcement should detain Pais for a mental-health evaluation.

Americans say Muslims face most intolerance in USANATOLIA WASHINGTON

Eight in ten Americans believe Muslims face more discrimi-nation than any other group in the US, according to a poll by the Pew Research Center.

Eighty-two percent of respondents said Muslims face discrimination. Eighty percent of those surveyed said blacks faced some discrimination.

Pew released the figures

after the US President Donald Trump tweeted a video that attacked Muslim congress-woman Ilhan Omar from Minnesota.

The video was of a speech delivered by Omar in which she discussed how Muslim Amer-icans came to be seen as second-class citizens after the September 11, 2001, terror attacks. The pres-ident’s tweet mixed in footage from the attacks with parts of the speech.

Omar is one of the first Muslim lawmakers to be elected to Congress, alongside Michi-gan’s Rashida Tlaib, and has faced a flurry of attacks since she began in office this year.

The Muslim congresswoman said she has faced more death threats since the president posted the tweet, sparking crit-icism that Trump is condoning harmful attacks against the country’s own elected officials.

The survey was conducted

prior to the president’s tweet. Ninety-two percent of Demo-crats said there is discrimination against Muslims in America, with 75% saying there is a lot of dis-crimination, according to the poll.

While less Republican respondents said the same, 69%, a large majority, agreed.

The percentage of people that think Jews face “a lot” of dis-crimination nearly doubled since 2016, rising from 13% to 24%,

with 64% of respondents saying there is some discrimination against the group, according to Pew.

Race played a large factor in predicting how much discrimi-nation a respondent thought was happening. Seventy-three percent of black respondents said there is “a lot” of discrimi-nation against blacks and 63% of Hispanics said the same about d iscr iminat ion against Hispanics.

However, among whites, it was partisanship that was the biggest factor in deciding how they answered.

Among white Democrats and Democrat-leaning respondents, around two-thirds said there is discrimination against blacks, while only 16% of white Repub-licans and Republican-leaning respondents said the same.

The survey was conducted between March 20 and 25 and surveyed 1,503 adults.

Argentinian Economy Minister, Nicolas Dujovne (centre), talks during a press conference next to Argentinian Production and Work Minister, Dante Sica (left), and Argentinian Health and Social Development Minister, Carolina Stanley, at the presidential residence in Olivos, Buenos Aires, yesterday.

Macri freezes prices of basic goodsAFP BUENOS AIRES

Argentina’s President Mauricio Macri announced a freeze in the price of basic goods and public services yesterday in a bid to limit the impact of spiralling inflation that could hamper his re-election hopes in October.

Hit by soaring prices due to inflation that reached almost 55 percent over the last 12 months, many Argentines have been calling for a change in economic policy. “It’s a difficult time for Argentine families. March and

April have abnormally high levels of inflation due to the unstable exchange rate,” said Finance Minister Nicolas Dujovne.

The government has com-mitted to not increasing the price of public services such as transport, gas and electricity for the rest of the year. Added to that, it has agreed with busi-nesses to a freeze on the prices of 60 basic products, including meat, for at least six months.

The country’s 18 million pen-sioners and people receiving state subsidies will benefit from

price reductions and credit in those businesses.

Last year, under pressure from the International Monetary Fund (IMF), which agreed to a $56 billion loan, the Argentine government launched an aus-terity plan to try to reduce the state deficit.

“Given the exchange rate has started to stabilise, we think the time has come to offer a bit of relief to Argentines, who have made so many efforts these last few months that have been so difficult for everyone,” said a government statement.

60 charged in illegal prescription drug crackdownAP CINCINNATI

Federal authorities said yesterday they have charged 60 people, including a doctor accused of trading drugs and another of prescribing to his Facebook friends, for their roles in illegally prescribing and distributing millions of pills containing opioids and other drugs.

US Attorney Benjamin Glassman of Cincinnati described the action, with 31 doctors facing charges, as the biggest known takedown yet of drug prescribers. Robert Duncan, US attorney for eastern Kentucky, called the doctors involved “white-coated drug dealers.”

Authorities said the 60 includes 53 medical profes-sionals tied to some 350,000 prescriptions and 32 million pills. The operation was con-ducted by the federal Appala-chian Regional Prescription Opioid Strike Force, launched last year by the Trump administration.

Authorities said arrests were being made and search warrants carried out as they announced the charges at a news conference. They didn’t immediately name those being charged.

US health authorities have reported there were more than 70,000 drug overdose deaths in 2017, for a rate of 21.7 per 100,000 people. West Virginia and Ohio have regularly been among the states with the highest overdose death rates as the opioid crisis has swelled in recent years.

Among those charged was a Tennessee doctor who dubbed himself the “Rock Doc”.

15THURSDAY 18 APRIL 2019 HOME

Time management tool for studentswins top prize at CMU-Q HackathonTHE PENINSULA DOHA

The top prize for Carnegie Mellon University in Qatar’s Hackathon 2019 competition went to a time management tool for students. The app, which was developed by CMU-Q students Sideeg Hassan, Ammar Karkour, Abdullah Shaar and Shaden Shaar, uses a smart sorting algo-rithm that manages and sorts tasks for busy students, and uses advanced machine learning to find and retrieve answers to questions using speech recog-nition.

At the seventh edition of the student-led competition, 11 teams of young innovators par-ticipated in the round-the-clock race to create an app. Student competitors represented CMU-Q and Carnegie Mellon’s main campus in Pittsburgh, as well as Northumbria University in Qatar, Northwestern University in Qatar, Qatar University and Weill Cornell Medicine—Qatar. This

year’s competition also included a student from DPS Modern Indian School, the first time a high school student has participated.

“The Hackathon format is intensive, with a tight timeline and high levels of competition,” said Dan Phelps, associate teaching professor of infor-mation systems and the faculty advisor for the event. “This is excellent experience for students who are interested in high tech because they learn to harness their creative energy, collaborate in teams and produce an app in a t i m e p r e s s u r e d environment.”

This year’s Hackathon was

sponsored by Siemens in Qatar, who provided judges and mentors for the competition and presented prizes to the four winning teams.

Adrian Wood, the company’s CEO in Qatar and one of the Hackathon judges, was impressed with the efforts of the young techs. “Knowing the potential that a hackathon can bring to the tech industry sets the bar very high for participants, and we can expect to hear about the next big app from an event like this,” he said.

Siemens registered 7,300 inventions worldwide in 2018, averaging 33 inventions per day. More than 25 percent of Siemens’ patent applications are in the area of digitalisation.

After spending 24 hours developing an app, each team had six minutes the project to the panel of judges. The panel included Adrian Wood, Claudio Ranaudo and Anirban Pal of Siemens, Houda Bouamor of CMU-Q; and Shah Kamaly of

Ooredoo. In addition to the Best

Overall App, teams were recog-nised in three other categories. The Best Technical App category went to Mohammed Siddiqui from Carnegie Mellon’s main

campus, Faiq Defiandry and Akhyar Kamili of CMU-Q, and Mohamed Ashraf from Qatar University.

The Best Design award went to CMU-Q students Amer Ahmad, Sameer Ahmad, Mohamed

Hamdi and Ishaq Hasan. The Rookie Award went to Achira Bhattacharyya, Northwestern University in Qatar, Shreyensh Soni, Northumbria University in Qatar, and Nafeel Ahmad of DPS Modern Indian School.

The winners of the Best Overall App category.

At the seventh edition of the student-led competition, 11 teams of young innovators participated in the round-the-clock race to create an app.

QCRI to host Creative Space Fair for children THE PENINSULA DOHA

Qatar Computing Research Institute (QCRI), part of Hamad Bin Khalifa University (HBKU), is to host a Creative Space Fair on April 27. The fair aims to promote science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) disci-plines among children, teenagers, and adults through innovative learning activities.

Participating institutions, including STEM Hub of Texas A&M University, Qatar Scientific Club, ibTECHar, Tebyan, and Geek Express, will each present unique opportunities to help stu-dents’ learn STEM skills in an attractive and creative way, including a live science show pre-sented by the STEM hub. The highly engaging activities are designed to cater to three different age groups: 6 years and under, ages 7 to 10, and 11 to 14.

Creative Space Fair will explore several themes such as coding, electronics, robotics,

chemistry, thermodynamics, and renewable energy.

Dr Eman Fituri, senior program manager at QCRI, said: “Our annual Creative Space Fair is a fantastic opportunity for stu-dents to see how STEM is used all around us and to pique their interest in the different fields from an early age.

The interactive event has proved popular among the wider community and we are expecting to welcome more than 500 vis-itors this year. We invite parents to bring along their children for a stimulating day out that promotes learning through fun and engaging activities.”

Advanced activities for older children will include Arduino pro-gramming, 3D printing, laser cutting, mobile application devel-opment, and robotics, among others.

Creative Space Fair will be held from 11 am to 3 pm at Resear-chery (formerly the HBKU Research Complex) in Education City.

STK Doha wins Favourite Newcomer Award THE PENINSULA DOHA

The Ritz-Carlton, Doha has announced that STK Doha has received Favourite Newcomer Award at the Fact Dining Awards Doha 2019.

STK opened its doors to welcome guests in January 2019. The modern steakhouse has quickly accelerated to becoming a local favourite as guests enjoy the tender cuts of USDA Prime beef and a succulent selection of sides such as truffle mac & cheese and mushroom pot pie. STK Doha is also the only res-taurant in Qatar to serve the much beloved hida beef, one of the highest qualities of Japanese wagyu.

Speaking on the occasion, Christian Sack, General Manager of The Ritz-Carlton, Doha, stated: “STK Doha is game changer within the Qatar dining scene. The restaurant delivers a dining and ambience combination unlike anything else in the country. We are certainly hon-oured to be awarded a Fact Dining Award and our STK team

has certainly earned it.”STK Doha is the first newly

opened restaurant under The Ritz-Carlton, Doha’s re-imagi-nation efforts. The hotel will also welcome the modern French brasserie, Sel & Miel, this Spring

along with the long awaited B-Lounge by Buddha Bar this Fall.

The Fact Dining Awards cer-emony is hosted annually by Fact Magazine and this is the fifth year the publication has held the

highly anticipated event in Qatar. Winners are selected through a public voting system and critics’ opinions. Over 38, 000 people participated in voting this year and STK alone received 30,000 unique online votes.

The employees of the STK Doha with the award.

Equine Reproduction and Neonatology Conference to be held from April 19 to 21THE PENINSULA DOHA

Qatar Foundation’s (QF) Equine Reproduction and Neonatology Conference 2019 will take place from April 19 to 21 in Doha.

The conference will feature international speakers and will address a wide range of equine-related reproduction issues. Hosted by QF’s Equine Veterinary Medical Center (EVMC), in part-nership with Al Galayel Equine Center, the conference will take place at the Qatar National Con-ference Center (QNCC) and EVMC’s state-of-the-art facility located in Al Shaqab.

Lectures will be delivered by keynote speakers known for their scientific contributions and pro-fessional experience in the field, including Dr Mats Troedsson, Dr Stefania Bucca and Dr Luis Losinno. Lectures will be followed by a roundtable discussion on

reproductive and neonatology topics of specific interest to the Middle East region. Topics for dis-cussion at the conference include the pitfalls of breeding sub-fertile individuals, optimisation of embryo performance, identifi-cation of high-risk pregnancy, and neonatology.

A practical workshop will be held on the final day of the con-ference, covering embryo transfer, high-risk pregnancy, and neonatology. The participants will see the latest techniques in practice with live patients.

Dr Jessica Johnson, Acting Director of EVMC, said: “We’re delighted to welcome Qatar’s equine community to this important conference with leading veterinarians in repro-duction and neonatology. The lec-tures and discussions are very rel-evant to the reproduction issues facing horse owners here in Qatar and the region.”

AAB-Toyota awards winners of ‘Dream Car Art Contest’THE PENINSULA DOHA

Abdullah Abdulghani & Bros. Co (AAB), sole dealers for Toyota in Qatar, has awarded the lucky winners of the ‘13th Toyota Dream Car Contest’ in a special ceremony.

The participation numbers for this year’s event, as antici-pated, exceeded expectations with over 1,500 registered young participants from over 160 schools further endorsing the widespread popularity of the Contest.

The Award Ceremony which was held at AAB’s main Toyota showroom on April 1, saw winners of all three age cate-gories receiving individual cer-tificates, medals and gifts and with the representatives of their

respective schools also receiving special congratulatory mementos. All the winning drawing will be sent to Japan for the Global competition and one of the winner could be lucky to travel to Japan in a trip fully paid with his parents.

Under the category 1 for children below the age of 8, Palak Banzal from DPS - Modern Indian School won first prize. The second and third prizes went to Serah Maria Rejeesh from DPS - Modern Indian School and Aaliya Rafeek from MES Indian School.

Under the category 2 for children between the ages of 9 and 11, Krishna Mahesh Kumar from MES Indian School received first prize. Payal Ramesh Attu-valappil from Birla Public School and Neeraj Rengith Chandran

from Shantiniketan Indian School won second and third prizes, respectively.

Under the category 3 for children between the ages of 12 and 15, Khadijah bint Shabbir Ali from Al Arqam International Academy for Girls got first prize. Nandana Biju Kumar from Birla Public School received second prize and Janisha Meshak Sel-varaj from MES Indian School won the third prize.

As Abdullah Abdulghani believes in cultivating the Qatari community, and in line with AAB’s vision to develop and promote local talent, Special Jury Awards were also presented.

The winner of Special Jury Awards under the category 1 is Fatima Mohammad Al Kaabi from Afwaz Global School. Al Reem Hamad Abdelaziz Al Yafei

from Al Bayan Primary School and Khalfan Fahad Al Sowaidi from Afwaz Global School won the award of category 2.

The Special Jury Awards of category 3 went to Haleema Hassan Ali Abdullah Hiji Al Baker from Moza Bint Mohammed Pre-paratory School and Haya Hassan Al Muhannadi from Al Khor Independent Preparatory School.

R K Murugan, Acting Chief Executive Officer, said that as one of AAB’s community-ori-ented initiatives, the ‘Toyota Dream Car Contest’ held a special place in their hearts as it involved children, the future ‘guardians of the world’. He also showed the Company’s hap-piness in seeing the increasing number of kids and schools taking part in such a contest.

R K Murugan, Acting Chief Executive Officer, with the winners of 13th Toyota Dream Car Contest at the award ceremony.

16 THURSDAY 18 APRIL 2019MORNING BREAK

FAJRSHOROOK

03. 50 AM05. 09 AM

11. 33 AM03. 03 PM

06. 00 PM07. 30 PM

ZUHRASR

MAGHRIBISHA

PRAYER TIMINGS

WEATHER TODAY

Courtesy: Qatar Meteorology Department

Minimum Maximum25oC 37oC

HIGH TIDE 03:21 –15:59 LOW TIDE 10:59 – 22:58

Relatively hot daytime with slight dust and

some clouds, mild by night.

Novel gesture to train women football coaches THE PENINSULA DOHA

Leading football organisations in Qatar have joined forces with the Royal Dutch Football Association (KNVB) to deliver a successful training course for female football coaches in the country.

A total of 45 participants received certifications for the coaching and life skills course organised jointly by the

Qatar Football Association (QFA) with the KNVB and Qatar Women’s Sports Committee (QWSC), with participation from 15 Generation Amazing female coaches, the Supreme Committee for Delivery and Legacy (SC) said on its website.

“I would like to thank QFA for the good cooperation in the course which has been completed, 45 participants received certificates, and we are more than happy with the way things are

proceeding,” said Johan van Geijn, Specialist for International CSR Part-nerships at KNVB.

“The talks that we have between the two football associations have been very fruitful, we look forward to four years of working together with the support of our government. For the women’s domain I think we can make good strides.”

The course represented the third time the parties had worked together

for women’s football development in Qatar. In April 2018, the KNVB part-nered with the QWSC and conducted a course for female coaches in coop-eration with EVO Soccer. The training programme was endorsed by QFA, and laid the foundations to reach an agreement for further cooperation with the KNVB. In December 2018, a refresher course served as the corner-stone and activation for a MoU between QFA and the KNVB.

Education Conference 2019 to begin on April 24

SANAULLAH ATAULLAH THE PENINSULA

The Ministry of Education and Higher Education will organise the Education Conference 2019 under the theme ‘Education Makes a Difference’ on April 24 and 25 at Qatar National Convention Center (QNCC).

The event, an educational scien-tific platform to share local, regional and international experiences; ideas and best practices in the field of edu-cation, will be attended by about 2,500 academics, researchers and experts from Qatar and abroad. Dar Al Sharq will be the media partner of the Education Conference.

Richard Gerver, one of the most inspirational leaders of his gener-ation, will be the official speaker at the opening ceremony of the

conference. However, Dr Hitmi Khalifa Al Hitmi, a researcher and lecturer at Qatar University and the University of Edinburgh, will officially speak at the closing ceremony.

This was announced at a press conference held at the headquarters of the Ministry of Education and Higher Education.

The Assistant Under-Secretary for Educational Affairs at the Ministry of Education and Higher Education, Fawzia Abdulaziz Al Khater, said that the conference will focus on three axes: the local and international trends in the development of the edu-cational process; the consolidation of education and cultural identity; and the quality management in

education. She said that under local and international trends in the devel-opment of the educational process, participants will address the educa-tional competencies and their role in meeting the needs of education in the twenty-first century and the quality of education that adopts STEM system.

“All these axes contribute to the goal of the Ministry through the con-ference, which is the role of education in building and developing societies and creating positive developments that contribute to achieving the vision of the Ministry in line with the Qatar National Vision 2030,” said Al Khater.

She pointed out that the event also includes 12 interactive sessions

at the student research exhibition accompanying the conference with the participation of local and inter-national universities, educational institutions, research centres and educational companies, offering the latest technologies in the field of education.

Head of the Scientific Committee of the Education Conference 2019, Mariam Al Buainain said that about 2,500 academics from around the world will participate in the exchange of educational practices and experi-ences among them. “The committee received 500 papers out of which 120 were selected to present at work-shops and panel discussions during the conference,” said Al Buainain.

Fawzia Abdulaziz Al Khater and Mariam Al Buainain with senior officials representing the sponsoring companies of ‘Education Conference 2019’ after a press conference held to announce the details of the conference at the Ministry, in Doha yesterday. PIC: SALIM MATRAMKOT / THE PENINSULA

The event, an educational scientific platform to share local, regional and international experiences; ideas and best practices in the field of education, will be attended by about 2,500 academics, researchers and experts from Qatar and abroad. Dar Al Sharq will be the media partner of the Education Conference.