Monday 2 February 2015 • 13 Rabial II 1436 • Volume 19 Number 6329
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Monday 2 February 2015 • 13 Rabial II 1436 • Volume 19 Number 6329
www.thepeninsulaqatar.com
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Editorial: 4455 7741 | Advertising: 4455 7837 / 4455 7780
OPINION
Qatar make handball history
Handball: A
historical
achievement
The statement hinted that the
current space crunch at Indian
schools would be addressed with
opening of more schools in the
next academic year. The academic
year in Qatar starts in September,
although the Indian schools start
classes earlier in April.
Seven new schools and kindergartens following the Indian
curriculum were opened in the
2014-2015 academic year and 14
new Indian schools and kindergartens are expected to open in
the next academic year. Currently
there are 29 schools and kindergartens in Qatar catering to
the Indian community, said the
statement.
he handball match
between
Qatar
and France at Lusail
Multipurpose Hall was historical and closely fought. It
m a rke d
a critical shift
in
the
history
of
the
game,
since its
establ i s h - Dr Khalid Al Jaber
m e n t
seventy years ago. The success of the Qatari team which
won the silver medal in the
24th Men’s Handball World
Championship in Doha is
very signiﬁcant. Qualifying
for the ﬁnal itself is a major
achievement because it’s
the stage every team looks
forward to. Handball tournaments have been becoming popular in the past few
years and Qatar’s excellent
performance has made the
game even more popular in
our region.
Secondly, the Qatari team
was able to beat all expectations as many were not
expecting them to perform
so spectacularly and reach
the ﬁnal after beating prominent teams like Slovenia,
which had come fourth in the
last World Cup, Germany,
the champions of 2007, and
Poland. The low expectation
was understandable considering Qatar has no long history of playing this game.
Qatar’s performance shows
that the government’s policy
of investing in sports is paying off and has made Qatar
a major destination in sports.
Continued on page 2
THE PENINSULA
Continued on page 4
THE PENINSULA
T
The Emir H H Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani attended the closing ceremony of the 24th Men’s Handball World Championship at the Lusail Multipurpose Hall yesterday. The Deputy Emir
H H Sheikh Abdullah bin Hamad Al Thani and the Emir’s Personal Representative H H Sheikh Jassim bin Hamad Al Thani and H H Sheikh Abdullah bin Khalifa Al Thani also attended the
ceremony. Qatar won the silver medal after losing to France 22-25. Qatar became the ﬁrst non-European team to win a silver medal in the Handball World Cup. See also pages 30, 31 and 32
Syria mission
stops renewal
of passports
Embassy follows directive by SNC
DOHA: The Syrian embassy
run by the country’s national
opposition here has stopped
renewing expired passports of
Syrian expatriates.
The move follows directives from the Syrian National
Coalition (SNC) leaders who
decided that the passport renewal
initiative was illegal.
“There could be legal hassles.
Those with passports renewed
by the embassy in Doha could
face imprisonment overseas for
three to eight years,” said Khaled
Khoja. Only Qatar recognises the
renewal, he added.
Head of the Syrian National
Opposition based in Istanbul,
Turkey, Khoja said they were now
working to issue temporary travel
documents to Syrians abroad
through the United Nations.
The Syrian National Coalition
announced recently it would
renew those passports of Syrians
in Qatar that had expired after
six years but were valid for fouryear renewal.
Last Thursday, the embassy
here, in fact, accepted 21 applications for renewal and turned back
many aspirants since their passports had outlived their 10-year
validity.
Syrian passports are issued for
six years and can be renewed for
another four years, after which
the holder must apply for fresh
passport.
Khoja told reporters and
Syrian media activists in Istanbul
that only Qatar had recognised
the validity extension stickers
the Syrian embassy in Doha was
putting on expired Syrian passports. “This means that the holders of these passports could not
travel out of Qatar.”
Khoja said they had sent a
message to the embassy in Doha
to immediately stop renewing
expired passports of Syrian expatriates. “It was an illegal act.”
According to Khoja, the
National Coalition is talking to
Germany to coordinate with the
UN so that temporary travel documents could be issued to Syrians
overseas.
“Like how Iraqis who were
based abroad were issued such
documents in 2003. We are trying to do a similar thing,” Khoja
told reporters in the Turkish city.
Talks with Germany were still
going on led by Riyad Hijab, the
former prime minister of the
Syria under President Bashar Al
Assad who defected in 2012, said
Khoja, alaraby.co.uk, the website
of London-based Arabic daily,
Alaraby Al Jadeed, reported.
THE PENINSULA
14 new Indian schools this year
DOHA: Fourteen new private
schools and kindergartens following the Indian curriculum
are expected to open in Qatar
in the next academic year, the
Supreme Education Council
(SEC) said yesterday.
Responding to a report carried
by The Peninsula yesterday on the
severe shortage of seats at Indian
schools, the SEC said that it had
asked only one Indian school —
MES Indian School — to stop new
admissions.
Quoting school ofﬁcials, The
Peninsula report said that most
Indian schools have stopped
admissions because they have no
more seats to offer.
In a clariﬁcation sent to this daily
yesterday, the SEC, however, said
that admission is still open in all
Indian schools, except the MES. The
MES was asked to stop admissions
because the number of students at
the school has reached 10,476, almost
double the permitted number of
5400 students, said the SEC.
This ceiling was ﬁxed by the
joint services department at
the SEC as per the terms and
conditions.
“The school was notiﬁed to
provide alternative building during the academic years 20122013 and 2013-2014 but there
was no response from the owner.
Registration (for new admissions) at the school was stopped
considering the safety and security of the students,” said the
statement.
SCH reports new MERS case
DOHA: The Supreme Council of Health (SCH) has reported a
new MERS (Middle East Respiratory Syndrome) case in Qatar,
which is the ﬁrst conﬁrmed case since the beginning of this year.
A 55-year old expatriate patient has tested positive for the deadly
virus, the SCH said yesterday. The last MERS case in the country
was reported in October last year, involving a 43-year old citizen.
The total number of MERS cases in Qatar has now reached a dozen.
The patient had been suffering from fever for four days along with
joint pain. He was transferred to the Hamad General Hospital where he
is currently undergoing treatment. The infection was conﬁrmed after
tests conducted at the national reference laboratory in Doha, SCH said.
“The Rapid Response Team of the SCH conducted an epidemiological investigation including line listing of all close contacts to the
infected and initiated screening. Health education about preventive
measures was given to the contacts while follow-up is on for any
symptoms. Infection prevention and control measures in all health
facilities have been re-enforced,” said a SCH statement.
As a precaution, the SCH has advised people visiting farms, markets, barns, or other places where animals are present to practise
general hygiene, including regular hand washing before and after
touching animals, and avoiding contact with sick animals. People with
diabetes, renal failure, chronic lung disease and impaired immune
responsiveness (immunocompromised) are considered to be at high
risk of severe disease from MERS infection. They should avoid contact with camels, drinking raw camel milk or eating meat that has
THE PENINSULA
not been properly cooked, SCH said.
Qatar’s population falls by 11,000 in January
DOHA: Qatar’s population has fallen by
almost 11,000 in January as compared to
the previous month (December 2014). This
is the second successive month in which
the country’s population has dropped. In
December 2014, the decline was a little
more than 34,000 over the preceding month.
Figures released by the Ministry of
Development Planning and Statistics suggest
that at the end of last January, the country’s
population was 2.22 million (2,224,583).
The population ﬁgure as on December 31,
2014 was over 2.23 million (2,235,431), with
men as usual (1.68 million) far outnumbering
women (549,203).
Observers say that while looking at
January’s population ﬁgures one must remember that a lot of Qatari and expatriate families
are overseas due to school vacations.
The country’s population rose by slightly
more than 190,000 in 2014 led mainly by largescale recruitment of foreign workers for FIFA
2022-linked development projects.
THE PENINSULA
Egypt frees Jazeera
journalist Greste
DOHA:
Aljazeera
journalist
Peter Greste was released from a
Cairo jail yesterday and left Egypt
for his native Australia after 400
days in prison on charges that
included aiding a terrorist group,
security ofﬁcials said.
There was no ofﬁcial word on
the fate of his two Aljazeera colleagues — Canadian-Egyptian
Mohamed Fahmy and Egyptian
national Baher Mohamed — who
were also jailed in the case that
provoked an international outcry.
The three were sentenced to
seven to 10 years on charges including spreading lies to help a terrorist organisation — a reference to
the outlawed Muslim Brotherhood.
One month ago, however, a court
ordered their retrial.
A security ofﬁcial said Fahmy
was expected to be released from
Cairo’s Tora prison within days.
His ﬁancée said she hoped he
would be free soon and deported
to Canada. “His deportation is in
its ﬁnal stages. We are hopeful,”
Marwa Omara told Reuters.
Canada’s foreign ministry
welcomed what it called positive developments. “We remain
very hopeful that Mr Fahmy’s
case will be resolved shortly,” it
said in a statement.
Aljazeera said its campaign to
free its journalists from Egypt
would not end until all three were
released. “We’re pleased for Peter
and his family that they are to be
reunited. It has been an incredible
and unjustiﬁable ordeal for them,
and they have coped with incredible
dignity,” said Mostefa Souag, acting Director General of Aljazeera
Network said in a statement.
“We will not rest until Baher
and Mohamed also regain their
freedom. The Egyptian authorities
have it in their power to ﬁnish this
properly today and that is exactly
what they must do,” he added.
Baher Mohamed was given an
extra three years for possessing
a single bullet. If the authorities decide to free him, resolving
his case could be more complex
because he does not possess a foreign passport.
The Interior Ministry said on
its Facebook page that Egypt
President Abdel Fatah Al Sisi
released Greste under a decree
issued in November authorising the president to approve the
deportation of foreign prisoners.
THE PENINSULA
See also page 7
MONDAY 2 FEBRUARY 2015
www.thepeninsulaqatar.com
02
HOME
Qatar condemns
execution of
Japan hostage
Croatian ties reviewed
DOHA: Qatar condemned the
execution of the second Japanese
hostage Kenji Goto, describing
it as an act of terrorism.
In a statement yesterday,
the Foreign Ministry expressed
Qatar’s solidarity with the
Japanese government and people.
It reiterated Qatar’s rejection
of violence in all forms and manifestation whatever its source and
motivation and said such a crime
violates ethical and humanitarian
principles and values.
The ministry expressed Qatar’s
condolences and sympathy to
Japan and the victims’ families.
QR28m QC projects
in Sudan last year
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The Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of State for Cabinet Affairs H E Ahmed bin Abdullah bin Zaid
Al Mahmoud yesterday met the Croatian Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Interior, Ranko Ostojic,
and discussed relations and issues of joint interest. The Croatian Ambassador, Tomislav Bosnjak, and
ofﬁcials from the Cabinet General Secretariat were present.
10,756 driving licences
issued in December
DOHA: The total number
of driving licences issued
last December increased by
15.6 percent to 10,756 compared to 9,306 in November,
according to ‘Qatar Monthly
Statistics- January 2015’ bulletin released yesterday.
Licences issued to nationals and residents in December
jumped by 23.6 percent and 15.1
percent, respectively.
Total vehicles registered
increased by 15 percent to
11,743 last December compared
to 10,212 in previous month.
Among the vehicles, private
vehicles had the lion’s share,
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Tel + 974 44195000
Fax + 974 44195100
Ooredoo offers
free unlimited
data today
DOHA:
To
celebrate
the exemplary performance of Qatar’s team in
the 24th Men’s Handball
World
Championship,
Ooredoo has announced
that all Shahry Smart
and Hala Smart pack
customers will receive
free unlimited data from
6am until 11.59pm today.
The offer is designed to
enable fans to share their
photos and comments on
social media, following
last night’s exciting ﬁnal
against France.
“Sport has the ability
to bring the community
together, and this is what
Qatar 2015 has done.
“Hosting this championship is important for the
country to show the world
that we can organise a
great event, and Ooredoo
is pleased and proud to
have supported Qatar
2015 and our national team
every step of the way,” said
Fatima Sultan Al Kuwari,
Director, Community and
Public Relations, Ooredoo.
Ooredoo was a Prestige
Partner for the event and
supported the national
team through advertising
in Ooredoo retail shops, on
self service machines and
online.
SEC pledges
to address
complaints
Continued from page 1
“We welcome suggestions and complaints from
the public through The
Peninsula and other local
media and assure we will
consider all remarks and
address them in coordination with institutions and
departments at the SEC
concerned,” said the statement issued by the Media
and Communication Ofﬁce,
SEC.
THE PENINSULA
witnessing over 7,100 registrations. Private vehicles registered a growth of 13 percent in
December compared to previous month.
At Hamad International
Airport, the number of arrivals and departures increased by
about 15 percent and 23 percent, in December.
Violations at municipality
level totalled 3,980 at all municipalities. The number of cleaning violations was highest with
1,181, followed by food-related
violations which stood at 1,160.
The bulletin shows that
total electricity generated in
December decreased by about
16.3 percent and total water
generation by 2.2 percent compared to November data.
The bulletin reveals that the
population in December stood
at 2.2 million, down 1.5 percent
from 2.3 million in November.
As for foreign trade, Japan
came ﬁrst for Qatar’s exports
worth over QR8.7bn. South
Korea was second (QR6.9bn)
and India third (QR4.4bn).
The maximum imports
were from the US (QR1.3bn).
China (QR1.2bn) and Germany
(QR834m) were second and
third.
THE PENINSULA.
DOHA: Qatar Charity (QC)
implemented projects worth
QR28m in Sudan last year, beneﬁting about 152,000 people.
In a statement, QC said the
projects covered health, water,
education, orphan sponsorship,
shelter and support for women
and children in 10 states.
QC has spent more than
QR10m to support women, families and children and over QR2m
on seasonal and relief projects.
A total of 227 income-generating projects worth QR773,000
were also launched to provide
interest-free loans, in partnership
with local organisations.
New manager for
Bedaya Center
DOHA: Reem Al Sowaidi has
been appointed as the new
Manager of Bedaya Center for
Entrepreneurship and Career
Development, a joint initiative
of Qatar Development Bank
and Silatech. The Qatari graduate with a BA degree in international business from Stenden
University Qatar joined the cenQNA
tre in May 2012.
‘WISE and Katara awards to
promote literacy great steps’
Hasan Chougule, Guest of Honour and Chief Patron of DPS-MIS (Doha) speaking at the event.
BY MOHAMMAD SHOEB
Instituting
awards
DOHA:
such as WISE and Katara Prize
for Arabic Novel by Qatar to
promote education and literary movements
reﬂects the
out-of-the-box thinking of the
country’s leadership, a former
Indian ofﬁcial said yesterday.
“No other country thought
about instituting such prizes,
but Qatar took these initiatives
to promote education in and
outside the country,” said Syed
Shahid Mehdi, a retired Indian
Administrative Services ofﬁcer
and former Jamia Millia Islamia
(JMI) vice-chancellor.
Mehdi, also an educationist,
said, “I am glad to say that one
of these prizes, which is considered equivalent to Nobel Prize
for Education, went to an Indian
organisation I am associated
with.”
In 2012, the Second $500,000
World Innovative Summit for
Education (WISE) prize went to
Dr Madhav Chavan, the founder
of ‘Pratham’ (the ﬁrst) that
reaches out to about three million
underprivileged primary school
children in India every year.
Mehdi is the founding board
member of Pratham’s Delhi
Chapter.
During his stint as vice-chancellor (2000 to 2004), he took
decisions that improved quality of education, including new
programmes such as Peace and
Conﬂict Management and Faculty
of Architecture and Ekistics in
Jamia Millia Islamia.
He was a chief guest at the 94th
Foundation Day Celebration of
JMI, organised and attended by
over 200 alumni working here in
various ﬁelds. The number of participants this year (second edition
of the event), witnessed a threefold jump compared to last year.
About the Indian community
in Qatar, Mehdi said, “I am happy
that India is playing an important role in the construction and
reconstruction of Gulf countries,
including Qatar. Our relationships
with Gulf states are very old and
traditional, based on symbiotic
and mutual beneﬁts.”
He said the region not only
meets India’s energy needs but
also a signiﬁcant portion of India’s
foreign exchange comes from this
region through remittances.
He said given the huge
contribution by moderate workers, the Indian government should
acknowledge their services during NRIs (Non-Resident Indians)
events instead of only focusing on
big businessmen living in Western
countries.
“The contribution of moderate
workers in terms of remittances
is much more than big NRI businessmen in the US and Europe,
so that should be adequately recognised,” said the former Indian
representative to Food and
Agriculture Organization ofﬁce
in Yemen.
Present were Hasan Chougule,
Guest of Honour and Chief Patron
of DPS-MIS (Doha), Syed Arif
Mehdi, Guest of Honour, Najmul
Hasan Khan and Shadab Khan
(Founders and Patrons of JMI
Alumni Association) and guests.
Chougule, the Doha-based
Indian educationist, called upon
the audience to comply with latest
education standards set by Qatar.
“We must upgrade our facilities
according to latest standards. In
case anyone facing genuine concerns or problems they can seek
time to comply with that instead
of expecting things to remain
static.”
THE PENINSULA
MONDAY 2 FEBRUARY 2015
www.thepeninsulaqatar.com
HOME
03
30m man-hours without loss
time injury in Dukhan project
Ashghal, partners reach milestone in highway central expressway work
A scene from the ﬁlm Rocky.
DFI Pop-Up Cinema to
screen Rocky to mark
National Sport Day
DOHA: To celebrate National
Sport Day on Tuesday, Katara
Cultural Village and Doha
Film Institute (DFI) will hold
a free screening of the classic
1976 sports ﬁlm Rocky starring Sylvester Stallone in his
most iconic role.
The ﬁlm will be shown at
7pm at Katara’s Marina Park
next to its main entrance and
St. Regis.
Rocky Balboa, a down-andout club ﬁghter from the mean
streets of Philadelphia, gets an
unlikely shot at the world heavyweight championship when
he takes on reigning champion
Apollo Creed.
The irresistible story of
the boxer who gives his all to
win the title won Academy
Awards for Best Picture and
Best Director and catapulted
Stallone to stardom.
The National Sport Day is a
national holiday in Qatar and
marked on the second Tuesday
in February. It aims to promote
a healthy lifestyle.
Qatar is one of the few
nations to dedicate a day to
sports.
The screening is part of DFI’s
Pop-up Cinema, a series of free
outdoor screenings for ﬁlm
lovers taking place throughout
the cooler months and featuring DFI’s signature mix of speciality ﬁlm programming and
cultural events. The ﬁlm is in
English and will be presented
without Arabic subtitles.
For details Pop-up Cinema
dates and timings and other
screenings and events, visit
www.dohaﬁlminstitute.com
THE PENINSULA
RasGas lines up activities
at Aspire Zone Foundation
DOHA:
RasGas
Company
Limited (RasGas) is partnering for the fourth consecutive year with Aspire Zone
Foundation (AZF) to celebrate
National Sport Day at Aspire’s
Warm-Up Track and Field.
“RasGas has been among
the ﬁrst to make full use of the
holiday to foster sporty spirit
among our employees and we are
pleased to be hosting our events
for the fourth time at Aspire’s
Warm-Up Track and Field,”
said Ali Zayed Al Marri, Public
Affairs Manager, RasGas.
The event is expected to
attract over 3,500 employees of
the company and their families
for activities under the theme
‘Love Sport’. The day will feature
football, basketball and cricket
tournaments and individual
activities such as running, spinning and penalty kicking. Sports
entertainers will present acrobatic shows.
“We are proud to partner with
RasGas and be their choice for
the fourth consecutive year to
host activities for its staff and
families. It is part of our mission
and corporate social responsibility strategy to enable organisations and the whole community to
enjoy sports and physical activities and cater to their needs to
maximise the beneﬁt of such an
occasion,” said Nasser Abdullah
Al Hajri, Acting Marketing and
Communication Director, AZF.
THE PENINSULA
DOHA: The Public Works
Authority
(Ashghal),
the
joint venture of Consolidated
Contractors Company (CCC)
and
Teyseer
Contracting
Company working on Dukhan
Highway Central expressway
project has achieved 30m manhours without loss time injury
(LTI).
The milestone builds on the
previous achievement of 25m
man-hours without LTI by
Ashghal and the contractor
last July, which demonstrates
Ashghal’s commitment to the
welfare and safety of its employees and workers in the workplace
through rigorous strategies and
processes.
An award ceremony was held
at Ashghal headquarters to mark
the achievement. Representatives
from Ashghal’s Expressway
Programme, partners and CCC’s
safety manager attended.
Jalal Yousef Al Salhi, Director,
Infrastructure Affairs, of Ashghal,
awarded a certiﬁcate of appreciation to Bassam Salem, Project
Director, for achieving the milestone and company’s commitment
to ensure safety standards in the
workplace.
The achievement reﬂects
Ashghal’s commitment to the
highest safety standards by
requiring all contractors to
protect workers and commuters against workplace hazards
throughout the project period.
To comply with Ashghal’s
health and safety requirements in
Ofﬁcials at the award ceremony.
work zones, CCC/Teyseer raised
the safety bar by introducing a
safety and trafﬁc management
programme, which has been effective in delivering Ashghal’s objectives. The programme included
ﬁrst crash cushion, Europeanapproved and tested temporary
barriers — metal and concrete,
including accredited installation,
specialist road side working safety
training accredited to UK and
European standard.
The initiatives included intensive health and safety discussions
and awareness sessions, weekly
management inspections, access
control for sub-contractors, emergency support vehicles, site notice
boards and related procedures.
The Expressways Programme
has health and safety procedures
and policies across all projects
to ensure commitment of and
compliance by all contractors to
achieve zero percent incidents,
injuries, environmental harm, and
no security breaches.
The project is an integral part
of the Expressway Programme
that will create one of the
world’s most impressive urban
road networks. It includes a new
15km highway from west of Al
Wajbah Interchange to east of Al
Shahaniya.
It comprises a dual carriageway with four lanes in each direction, service roads and multi-level
interchanges to enhance trafﬁc
between Dukhan and the centre
of Doha. The new road will separate trafﬁc on the expressway
from that on local roads.
THE PENINSULA
Video games cost more during holidays
YASIN ABU TAQIU
KAKANDE
parents are
DOHA: Many
complaining that shops selling
video games for children have
increased their prices during
the ongoing school holidays.
Video games are a favourite
recreation for kids during holidays and a comfort for parents
as the games are played indoors.
Others like billiards are also
admired by holidayers but mostly
played at game centres and
require children to stay outside
their homes, said Shaﬁk Al Araby,
father of three.
He said every time he wanted
to buy new video games for his
children during holidays he found
most shops increasing the prices,
probably because there is always
a high demand during such times.
“With video games, kids can
stay and enjoy their holidays at
home,” he said. “If my children
have no games, they will want
me to take them out every time
Children playing a video game.
as the home gets boring to them,
but with my job I can’t afford to
take them out every time.”
A video game system is among
the most desired gifts among
schoolchildren. According to a
shopping centres, a complete
video game system such as Sony
PlayStation 4 (PS4) with 500GB,
a controller and with a game, cost
QR1,790, and with another game
QR1899, Sony PlayStation 3 (PS3)
with one game at QR1,349 and
Microsoft’s Xbox 360 with 4GB
QR1,499.
The shopping centre was
also offering single games at
QR160-QR300 such as Battleﬁeld
for PlayStation 4 at QR269.
Al Araby said his children
spent most of their weekly holidays going to malls, visiting relatives and friends and sometimes
revising their lessons for exams,
but preferred to play video games
during long holidays.
Salah Ahmed, an Egyptian
living in Old Airport Area, said
they would buy video games in
neighbouring countries whenever
they had a chance as those were
cheaper than in Qatar.
“I have visited stores in Doha to
ﬁnd a video game for my 10-yearold son but in every store I found
the games were overpriced. I
asked stores if they would have a
sale for games and most of them
said sales were for garments and
other basic electronics, not video
games.” He said his son has only
one video game with PlayStation
that was bought in Dubai last
summer holidays and is bored of
playing it again and again and
wants something new.
THE PENINSULA
Qatar Executive to ﬂy All-Premium Class Airbus A319
DOHA: Qatar Airways (QA)
has announced that it will add
an all-Premium Class Airbus
A319 to its growing corporate jet ﬂeet, Qatar Executive,
to meet the rising demand
for charter luxury group and
incentive travel.
The Premium One A319, which
is identical to QA Business One
operating daily between Doha and
London Heathrow, will be available for charter from February
17 through QA’s corporate jet
division.
The Airbus A319 can be booked
to destinations around the globe
with customised schedules, allowing for more ﬂexibility and the
option to reach remote or multiple locations in the shortest
time in comfort. Passengers are
offered an exclusive private jet
experience, award-winning service, spacious and bespoke cabins
and world-class cuisine.
The 40-seat Premium One
aircraft, which has one aisle, a
2-2 seating conﬁguration and a
range of up to 3,700km/6,850km,
can connect destinations in the
Middle East with major cities in
Europe, Africa and South Asia.
The A319 will join the growing
ﬂeet of Qatar Executive, offering private group travel to VIP
passengers.
The seats recline and convert
into 79-inch-long fully-ﬂat beds
which come with elegant Italian
Frette linen and duvet during
night ﬂights and are equipped
with power outlets, WIFI, GSM
services, USB port, audio sockets
and LED lighting.
The inﬂight Oryx entertainment system features the same
options available on QA, over
1,000 choices of movies, music and
games. Personal entertainment
can be enjoyed with latest-generation systems and noise-cancelling headphones. The chartered
Premium One service includes
access to executive airport facilities and concierge services in
Doha and abroad.
The Airbus A319 will be of
interest to tour operators and
wedding groups, who can design
tailored travel journeys for guests
and clients.
Corporations, business delegations, musicians or sports teams
can seamlessly travel and connect
their journeys with maximum
comfort.
Akbar Al Baker, Group Chief
Executive, QA, said: “Demand
for charter services continues
to grow and we have introduced
Premium One A319 to further
strengthen the proposition of
Qatar Executive which is providing convenience and choice in
private travel.”
David Edwards, Executive Vice
President, Qatar Executive, said:
“We look forward to meeting
the requirements of private customers, corporations and luxury
tour operators with this product.
Demand for Business Class group
travel has increased and the aircraft is ideally positioned to ﬁll
the gap in the market, particularly in the Middle East.”
Qatar Executive also operates
a wholly-owned ﬂeet of eight
Bombardier business jets, including four Global 5000s – among
them two Global 5000 Visions,
three Challenger 605s and one
Global XRS with a capacity of up
to 13 passengers.
THE PENINSULA
The Premium One A319 seats recline and convert into 79-inch-long fully-ﬂat beds.
04
Qatar team ends US visit
NEW YORK: The Qatari delegation, led by H
E Sheikh Mohammed bin Hamad Al Thani yesterday concluded its visit to the US.
The team included the Minister of Finance H
E Ali Sherif Al Emadi, the Central Bank of Qatar
Governor, Sheikh Abdulla bin Saoud Al Thani,
and the Qatar Investment Authority CEO, Sheikh
Abdullah bin Mohammed bin Saud Al Thani. The
delegation visited Wall Street, rang Nasdaq’s opening
bell and met top ofﬁcials and discussed cooperation
between Nasdaq and Qatar Exchange. The team met
Business Council for International Understanding
ofﬁcials and discussed economic cooperation and how
to increase trade and investment between both countries. They also met the New York Mayor, Michael
Bloomberg. The team also attended US-Qatar Forum
for Investment in Washington.
QNA
MONDAY 2 FEBRUARY 2015
www.thepeninsulaqatar.com
HOME
QRC begins Ebola awareness
campaign in Mauritania
DOHA: Qatar Red Crescent (QRC)
has launched an Ebola awareness
campaign in Mauritania, targeting
110,000 people, in cooperation with
Turkey’s IHH Humanitarian Relief
Foundation and Mauritanian Red
Crescent (MRC).
It is part of an international campaign to prevent serious outbreak in
four West African countries — Guinea,
Liberia, Sierra Leone, and Nigeria —
and protect other at-risk countries,
particularly in North Africa.
QRC’s ofﬁce in Mauritania’s
Bassiknou commune last July launched
informative programmes to raise
awareness of the Ebola virus and the
disease, its causes and symptoms and
how to prevent it.
The programmes targeted the commune’s population of 50,000 and the
Ombada refugee camp, which houses
nearly 60,000 Malians.
The ﬁrst phase of the project
involved training for 35 volunteers of
MRC, 20 of whom in Bassiknou town
and 15 at the refugee camp, in addition
to 1,000 families of which 500 in the
town and 500 at the camp.
QRC’s ofﬁce attends all meetings
at the Governor’s Bureau to monitor Ebola spread. A large team of
Mauritanian Red Crescent (MRC)
volunteers is utilised to reach out to
local communities.
Mauritania is near the West Africa
region, where many Ebola cases were
reported, particularly in Senegal and
Mali, which ofﬁcially recorded late in
September the ﬁrst death.
Despite the closure of borders with
the two countries, north-eastern
Mauritania has a long, open desert border with Mali, which leaves the Hodh
Ech Chargui region particularly vulnerable. QRC’s presence is welcomed
by people, who expressed gratitude for
its efforts to improve their lives and,
particularly, its medical assistance.
THE PENINSULA
A QRC volunteer delivering an Ebola awareness lecture to people in Mauritania.
QGBC to hold ﬁrst annual conference
DOHA: The Qatar Green Building
Council (QGBC), a member of Qatar
Foundation (QF), will hold its ﬁrst
annual conference at Qatar National
Convention Centre on April 27-28.
QGBC said yesterday it will take
a lead in the debate on sustainability
challenges and highlight research and
industry best practice. It will help the
construction and sustainable development sector to deliver green building
solutions to environmental challenges
in Qatar, the region and the world.
Participating academics and industry practitioners will share expertise in
discussions on four themes of relevance
to Qatar and the Gulf.
Upcoming needs of growing metropolitan areas will be addressed by
the ‘Future Sustainable Cities’ sessions, and maximising use of existing
buildings under the ‘Retroﬁtting Doha’
theme.
Cutting-edge sustainable technology
will be the focus of the ‘Passivhaus in
the Mena region’ session, with ‘Carbon
Footprint and Qatar’s National Vision’
presenting a valuable examination of
tackling emissions.
Saad Al Muhannadi, President,
QF, said, “The conference will set the
benchmark for green building and sustainability research in Qatar and the
region, which is an addition to QF’s
efforts to help the nation meet its sustainability challenges. I look forward to
the conference’s productive outcomes
and solutions to environmental challenges in the years ahead.”
Meshal Al Shamari, Director,
QGBC, said: “QGBC provides leadership and encourages collaboration to
promote environmentally sustainable
practices for green building design and
development in Qatar.
“The conference will bring together
leading academics, researchers and
green building practitioners to conduct
in-depth studies of the green building
and sustainability sector in Qatar and
beyond.
“QGBC welcomes stakeholders in
Qatar’s green building sector to use
the conference as an opportunity to
share knowledge and experiences with
the broader community to move steps
closer to helping Qatar establish a
more advanced green building culture,”
Al Shamari added.
Academic researchers and industry
practitioners, including property consultants, urban planners and landscape
architects from Qatar and beyond, are
encouraged to attend the conference
which will be addressed by national
and international sustainability and
green buildings experts.
THE PENINSULA
Aspire Torch Staircase Run in March
DOHA:
Following
successful
Aspire Torch Staircase Run in the
past three years, Aspire Zone has
announced that this year’s edition
will be held at the Torch Hotel to
be hosted on March 27-28.
The fourth edition will feature
the inaugural Towerrunning World
Championships 2015. Registration
begins today.
Aspire Zone is dedicated to organising events that promote a healthy
lifestyle and encourage the community to be active.
The run is praised as a landmark
event on the international tower runners’ calendar and includes a two-day
race programme with three heats
comprising different distances and
competition modes.
The ﬁrst route for all competitors
will consist 1,304 steps as runners
will have to make their way to the
top of the 300-metre tower on the
51st ﬂoor.
The Championships 2015 is the
highlight of the event as it is an
opportunity for the best towerruning
all-rounder to be crowned the sport’s
ﬁrst Global Champion.
This is the ﬁrst time Towerrunning
World Association (TWA) has
brought the event to the Middle East.
Abdulla Al Khater, Events
The winners with their trophies during Aspire Torch Staircase
Run last year.
Manager, Aspire Zone,
said, “We are honoured
to be hosting the fourth
edition of the run in
March and delighted that
Aspires was awarded the
Championships
2015.
Prestigious events such
as this one help raise
Qatar’s proﬁle as a sporting nation.”
The ﬁrst heat of the
run will take place in the
morning of March 27, with
over 500 local competitors
and international athletes
racing to the 51st ﬂoor of
the hotel.
The second heat will
take place in the afternoon with the top 30 male
and as many female competitors moving through
to the round based on an
individual time trial sprint
the same day.
The Championships
2015, or the third heat,
will take place on March
28 with top 30 male and
female athletes racing to
the top of the hotel in separate ﬁnals.
THE PENINSULA
Qatar has made its
imprint on global sports
Continued from page 1
Qatar has made its
imprint on the global
sports calendar through
organisation and participation in great events — like
the Asian Games 1988, tennis game in 1993, Athletics
in 1997, Golf 1998, Bicycles
race 2002, and motorcycles
2004.
Similar achievements
were realised during the
football World Cup for the
under-20 group in 1995.
Remarkable achievements
were made in 2006 at the
15th Asian Games and in
2010 when Qatar won the
bid for hosting World Cup
2022, in addition to the
current handball world
championship 2015.
Qatari teams in different sports have managed
to surpass all expectations.
Our teams have a long way
to go and will further make
huge gains.
The Qatari, Gulf and
Arab teams have a golden
opportunity to win World
Cup 2022. Of course it is a
big dream, but dreams and
aspirations have no limitations and we have already
proved that we can do it.
THE PENINSULA
MONDAY 2 FEBRUARY 2015
www.thepeninsulaqatar.com
HOME
Academic Bridge Program
honours student volunteers
DOHA: Qatar Foundation’s
Academic
Bridge
Program
(ABP) hosted a reception to
recognise its student volunteers
for their efforts in the Adult
Arabic Literacy Program.
More than 30 people attended
the reception in the Liberal Arts
& Sciences building.
Special guests included Issa
Al Mannai, Director, Reach Out
To Asia (ROTA), Hamad Al
Baker, Director, Public Relations
& Communications, Qatar
Petroleum (QP), Mohammed Al
Hajj, representative of Sheikh
Abdullah bin Zeid Al Mahmoud
Islamic and Cultural Center, and
Rasmeya Aljamali, Community
Development Specialist, ROTA.
Several ABP ofﬁcials and
members of ABP Social Services
& Volunteering Club were also
present.
Student volunteers, who are
also members of the club, were
recognised by Al Mannai for their
dedication to working with service employees to complete their
Arabic language training as part
of ROTA’s Adult Arabic Literacy
Course. The adult service employees who successfully ﬁnished the
ROTA programme were also
awarded certiﬁcates in recognition of their achievements by Al
Ofﬁcials and students at the reception.
Mannai.
The ROTA course is in collaboration with QP, the Islamic and
cultural Center and ABP.
Moza Al Boainain, Assistant
Director, Student Services, ABP,
and Advisor to the club, recognised all guests who had supported the ROTA course.
She thanked ABP students who
had volunteered to lead the training sessions for six weeks.
“It was one of our goals at the
club to provide opportunities to
our students to serve their community,” Al Boainain said.
She said the club in involved
in activities, including bake
sales, photo auction and other
fund-raisers to build a school
in Somalia. Students also visit
hospitals, assist at community
functions and deliver water and
snacks to workers out in the
daytime heat.
“Volunteerism is a great way to
show that students not only care
about the community but also
manage their time well to balance a volunteer job with other
commitments.” Al Mannai and
Al Baker acknowledged the hard
work of those who attended the
course and the commitment of
their volunteer teachers.
THE PENINSULA
Arab Mobile App Challenge winners named
DOHA: Ooredoo and Applied
Innovation
Institute
have
announced the regional ﬁnal
winners of the second Arab
Mobile App Challenge at an
event in Dubai.
A hardware kit that enables
kids and non-technical people
to invent the technology called
‘Snowball’ took ﬁrst place, winning $25,000.
Second place went to
‘Supermama’ a multiplatform
application to strengthen the
special connection between
mothers and their babies by providing the formers with personalised content about the growth
and health of their babies. The
Supermama team from Algeria
was awarded $15,000.
Dr Nasser Maraﬁh, Group
CEO, Ooredoo, which was one
of the lead sponsors, said: “What
I ﬁnd most impressive about this
year’s regional ﬁnalists is that
the vast majority of the applications are all about enriching
people’s lives.
“Ooredoo began its support
for the challenge because we
believe in helping young people
realise their potential, improve
their careers and give back to
their communities, which is
what this Pan Arab edition of
the challenge has enabled these
young people to do. I look forward to seeing their ideas at the
05
GU-Q to hold ‘Scapes
of Power’ forum
DOHA: Three of the world’s
most distinguished experts in
culture, politics, and Islamic
law and history will be among
global
scholars
participating in Georgetown University
in Qatar’s (GU-Q) ‘Scapes of
Power’ conference.
The two-day forum on the
GU-Q campus from tomorrow marks the school’s 10th
anniversary.
Dr L aura Doyle from
University of MassachusettsAmherst, Dr Sherman Jackson
(pictured) from University of
Southern California and Dr
John Esposito from Georgetown
University in Washington DC
will take part in the public
conference recognising a decade of academic and research
excellence.
The forum will bring together
specialists from historians to
economists to sociologists and
others to discuss a concept that
connects various academic disciplines: Power. What is power?
How is it exercised and by whom?
What changes over space and
time? These are the questions
that will be the highlight of the
engaging forum.
On the ﬁrst day, Dr Doyle will
deliver a keynote address on
‘Inter-imperial Powerscapes’.
The author and co-director of
World Studies Interdisciplinary
Project, which seeks to foster scholarship and teaching
informed by non-eurocentric
world history, will appraise how
empires operate as cooperative
units and inﬂuence a global environment rather than focusing on
empire as the speciﬁc area of a
state’s interests.
She will draw from her current project, combining recent
world historiography and postcolonial studies to reframe current
discussions on world politics, globalisation and empire.
Named among the top 500
most inﬂuential Muslims in the
world by Royal Islamic Strategic
Studies
Center,
Amman,
Jordan and Prince Alwaleed
Bin Talal Center for MuslimChristian Understanding at
GU in Washington DC, Dr
Sherman Jackson, a professor at University of Southern
California, will present the second keynote address on ‘Islam
and Power: Between Shariah and
the Islamic Secular’ and launch a
panel discussion on ‘Muslims in
a Global Perspective’.
The panel will include Dr John
L Esposito, University Professor
of Religion and International
Affairs at GU and Founding
Director of Prince Alwaleed
Bin Talal Center for MuslimChristian Understanding.
An expert on the Muslim
world, Dr Esposito is the editor of The Oxford Encyclopedia
of Modern Islam and The Oxford
History of Islam, and author of
Unholy War, What Everyone Needs
to Know about Islam, and other
acclaimed works.
His presentation ‘Religion and
Power in Muslim Politics’ will go
beyond a regional perspective to
analyse how religion and power
interact impact the Muslim
world.
The forum will include topics
spanning history from ancient
Rome to modern China and
charting the globe from Latin
America to Europe, Africa and
Asia.
Speakers will provide innovative perspectives on ways power
is manifest in subjects ranging
from women and gender to language, literature and the media.
Speaker panels are ‘Empire...
Then and Now, Within and
Beyond the Nation-State,
Empowering the Disempowered,
and Forging Knowledge and
Culture.
THE PENINSULA
Alert over shooting practice
DOHA: Qatar Armed Forces General Command has announced that
the marine shooting range (O.B.D-28) in east of Mesaieed near Fasht
Al Hadid will be active from February 1 to 10 and from February 2 to
April 30 from 6am to 5pm daily. It said in a statement that the range
is located towards the east from Mesaieed, a distance of about 40km
at an angle of 105 from the port of Mesaieed near Fasht Al Hadid
from the east and extends to the south of Shraouh Island. It urged
people frequenting the area to take precautions for their safety.
The Snowball team which won the ﬁrst prize of $25,000.
2015 Mobile World Congress in
Barcelona and wish them all the
very best of luck.”
Four teams took home a cash
prize aimed to set their ideas
in motion while seven teams
advanced to compete at the
Global Mobile Challenge during
the congress.
Launched in 2013, the
challenge enables teams of up to
six members under 35 to develop
mobile apps to make an impact
on the education, health, entertainment and employability/
entrepreneurship sectors.
This year was the ﬁrst time
the challenge was open to
teams from the entire Pan Arab
region and out of nearly 700
applications — up from 150 last
year — 22 teams from 12 Arab
countries were selected to participate. The programme aims
to introduce and educate young
Arabs on entrepreneurship, the
path to launching a start-up and
enhance their business skills and
design abilities.
THE PENINSULA
QNA media law training today
DOHA: Qatar News Agency (QNA) will today hold a training
course ‘Introduction to Media Law and Copyrights’ as part of a
series organised by the Department of Foreign Media Affairs to
train and rehabilitate Qatari cadres working in the media ﬁeld.
Journalists and representatives of media organisations will take
part in the three-day training by Dr Mahmoud Qalandar from the
QNA
Media Department, Qatar University.
TAMUQ begins third Liberal Arts International Conference
DOHA: Texas A&M at Qatar
(TAMUQ)
has
begun
its
third annual Liberal Arts
International Conference at
Hamad Bin Khalifa Student
Center in Education City.
The forum ends tomorrow.
It is organised by Liberal Arts
Program in collaboration with
The Initiative in Professional
Ethics (TIPE), an umbrella
organisation for all ethicsrelated activities at TAMUQ.
The branch campus and
Qatar National Research Fund
(QNRF) are co-sponsors and
Hamad Bin Khalifa University
is co-host.
“Texas A&M is recognised globally as a leader in engineering
education and research,” said
Dr Mark H Weichold, Dean and
CEO, TAMUQ.
“Part of its success rests on
its multidisciplinary approach,
which includes a commitment
to social sciences, arts and
humanities.
“Our Qatar campus is no
exception. Our substantial social
sciences, arts and humanities
faculty include internationally
recognised leaders in their ﬁelds
and our students take a variety
of these courses to complement
their engineering courses. This is
critical to creating future engineering leaders who are problem-solvers, innovative thinkers
and effective communicators.”
Dr Troy Bickham, Chair,
Liberal Arts Program, and
Professor of History, said, “We
are gratiﬁed by the large number
of participating scholars in Qatar
this year.
“The conference is an opportunity for scholars in the country in social sciences, arts and
humanities to engage with
each other and colleagues from
around the globe. This year, we
have scholars from six continents
and more than 20 countries coming to present research papers in
a variety of ﬁelds.”
The theme this year is
‘Looking Forward, Looking Back:
Transnational Perspectives on
Globalisation’. The event will
explore the impacts of globalisation from disciplinary lenses.
It will feature lectures and panels for students, faculty and staff
of educational institutions and
research centres in Qatar.
More than 70 delegates are
attending. Dr Leslie Seawright,
Conference Co-organiser and
Assistant Professor of Liberal
Arts, said, “This year, we are
welcoming participants who represent some of the most prestigious universities in the world
such as Oxford University in the
UK and Harvard University in
the US.”
Opening day keynote speaker
was Dr David Jolliffe, Professor
and Brown Chair of English
Literacy from University of
Arkansas, US. His address
‘Global Corporate Decisions,
Local Impacts and the Need for
Economic Literacy’ launched the
conference.
Today, the forum features a
keynote speech by Dr Michael
Reksulak, Director, Social
Sciences, Arts and Humanities,
QNRF.
Tomorrow, the keynote
speaker is Dr Tim Winter,
Professor and Research Chair
of Cultural Heritage from
Deakin University, Australia.
Delegates attending one of the sessions on the ﬁrst day of the forum yesterday.
He will give a talk on ‘Thermal
Modernities and the Entangled
Future of Air’.
Dr Nancy Small, Instructional
Associate Professor of Liberal
Arts, TAMUQ, said, “Being
interdisciplinary and transnational means that the conference
is a gathering of scholars and
rich in opportunity for inspiration and cross-pollination.
“Anchored by keynotes from
well-known speakers in a variety
of disciplines, the conference will
feature sessions that approach
globalisation and its implications
from interesting and compelling
perspectives. THE PENINSULA
06
MONDAY 2 FEBRUARY 2015
www.thepeninsulaqatar.com
MIDDLE EAST
Pilot’s plight shocks Jordanians
Pilot held by Islamic State puts King Abdullah in a tough spot
IS claims
beheading of
Iraqi security
personnel
AMMAN: The fate of a
Jordanian pilot held by Islamic
State (IS) has raised public
pressure on King Abdullah over
his country’s role in the US-led
military campaign against the
hardline group in Syria, fuelling the risk of broader discontent in the US ally.
After his capture in December,
militants released pictures of the
young pilot Muath Al Kasaesbeh
being led out of the water by
ﬁghters. His F-16 jet had smashed
onto the banks of the Euphrates
River in Islamic State’s stronghold in northern Syria.
The images of the young, newlywed pilot shocked Jordanians and
brought home the stakes of the
US-ally’s involvement the war.
King Abdullah has defended the
campaign, saying that moderate
Muslims need to combat a group
whose ideology and brutality have
insulted the spirit of Islam.
But in Kasaesbeh’s hometown
of Karak dozens of young people
protested, chanting anti-coalition
slogans and calling on the King to
pull out of the campaign.
“We will not be a sacriﬁcial
cow for America!” angry youths
chanted last month in a city
whose tribes have long been
a bulwark of support for the
Hashemite monarchy.
Although few believe the crisis
will compel Jordan to withdraw
completely from the campaign, it
may take a more low-key role like
in the past, analysts and diplomats say. King Abdullah’s father,
King Hussein, did not take part
in a US-led military campaign
against former Iraqi dictator
BAGHDAD: The Islamic State
group beheaded an Iraqi police
ofﬁcer and two soldiers, the latest in a long series of atrocities
committed by the militants,
according to pictures posted
online yesterday.
In one photo, a blindfolded
man said to be a police lieutenant
colonel kneels in a street in front
of a row of gunmen. A masked
militant is then shown beheading
the victim with a machete, after
which his severed head is placed
atop his body and the machete
driven into his back.
Another photo shows an overweight masked militant apparently struggling to behead a man
identiﬁed as a captured Iraqi
soldier. A second soldier was
beheaded at the same location,
according to another photo of
the scene. The authenticity of the
photos could not be independently
conﬁrmed.
IS spearheaded a sweeping militant offensive in June that overran large areas north and west
of Baghdad, and also holds signiﬁcant territory in neighbouring
Syria. The brutal militant group
has killed thousands of people in
both countries, some of them in
highly-choreographed videotaped
sequences in which the victims
are beheaded.
Iraqi security forces, backed
by Kurdish troops, Shia militias,
Sunni tribesmen and a US-led
campaign of air strikes, have
managed to regain some ground
from IS.
But the militants still control
signiﬁcant territory, including
three major cities.
AFP
Saddam Hussein after his invasion of Kuwait in 1990, going along
with public opinion which was
against military involvement.
By contrast, his son has taken
a bolder role in this campaign by
sending its jets to Syria — the ﬁrst
time Jordan took part on bombing
missions abroad rather than just
providing intelligence and logistical support.
King Abdullah’s stance stems
from his concern about the
heightened threat of militants to
his kingdom. Al Qaeda launched a
series of deadly attacks in Jordan
including a bombing on a hotel in
Amman in 2005, killing 60 people.
IS has called for the release
of Sajida Al Rishawi, one of the
hotel attackers who was convicted
after her explosive belt failed to
detonate. It has said it will spare
Kasaesbeh’s life if she is let go but
has not said it will release the
pilot. Seeking to rally his people,
King Abdullah has said concern
about the pilot’s plight united
all Jordanians and his capture
proved the war must be won. But
as he comforted Kasaesbeh’s parents and wife in the royal palace,
demonstrations took place.
“There is not an hour in the
day that me and the armed forces
are not working on this, our hero
the pilot. Unfortunately the war
today is one within the Islamic
world and it’s our war,” the King
told a group of tribal elders in a
visit ten days ago.
The case has polarised
Jordanians. Nationalists say it is
not time for recriminations and
have called for rallying behind
the throne while others say they
Saﬁ Yousef, father of Islamic State captive Jordanian pilot Muath Al Kasaesbeh, speaks at a news conference in
Amman yesterday.
will lay the blame on the country’s political rulers if the pilot
is killed.
“People will blame the Jordanian
regime and they will say why did
you send him to this war. No one
will blame IS if it executes him,
it will only increase support for
them,” said Ali Dalaen, a former
deputy from the pilot’s hometown.
He led a demonstration on
Friday calling for an end to military involvement and accusing
the government of not negotiating seriously with IS.
Some Jordanians have even
raised fears that Jordan would
send land troops to battle IS,
which is also known by the
Arabic acronym Daesh.
“We insist this is not our war
and if Daesh unfortunately sacriﬁces our son, we hope the wisdom of the government and the
King would be furthest away from
participating in a land campaign,”
said Hind Al Fayez, a deputy
from the powerful Bani Sakhr
tribe. Her comments provoked a
strong backlash. IS has released
three emotive videos in response
to repeated appeals by the family.
The group says their son’s bombing missions had been responsible
for the deaths of women and children. Observers say IS is trying to
deepen domestic rifts in a country whose security forces are
growing increasingly alarmed by
the appeal of militants ideology,
especially in impoverished cities
across the kingdom.
Dozens of youths even from the
pilot’s hometown have travelled
over the border to ﬁght alongside
hardline groups in Syria and as
far away as Afghanistan.
“It’s an impossible situation
for (Jordan). They don’t have a
decent hand,” a Western diplomat
in Amman said.
REUTERS
Japan condemns despicable IS hostage beheading claim
TOKYO:
Prime
Minister
Shinzo Abe yesterday condemned the announcement by
Islamic State militants that
they had beheaded second
Japanese hostage as “heinous
and despicable,” ending a hostage standoff that has rocked
the paciﬁst nation.
IS claimed in a video released
online that it had killed 47-yearold journalist Kenji Goto — the
second purported beheading of a
Japanese hostage in a week — but
made no mention of a Jordanian
pilot it has also threatened to kill.
“We will never forgive terrorists,” Abe told a crush of reporters
at his ofﬁce yesterday, appearing
to ﬁght back tears as he spoke.
“We will cooperate with the
international community to make
them atone for their crimes.”
The grisly video shows Goto,
a respected war correspondent,
wearing an orange outﬁt similar
to those worn by Guantanamo
Bay inmates, kneeling next to a
standing man dressed head-totoe in black with his face covered.
The man, who speaks with a
British accent, appears to be the
same IS militant who has featured in previous videos showing the execution of Western
hostages. He addresses Abe,
saying the killing was the result
of Tokyo’s “reckless” decisions
— a possible reference to aid it
has granted for refugees ﬂeeing IS-controlled areas in Syria
and Iraq — and would mark the
beginning of a “nightmare for
Japan”. The brief video, whose
content has not been veriﬁed,
ends with the image of a body and
a decapitated head on top of it.
“After an extensive review, we
Saudi Arabia
frees women’s
rights activist
Kuwaiti court jails stateless
activist for insulting emir
the conference’s ﬁnal communique. Political parties in Yemen,
including the Houthis, have spent
several days discussing the possibility of forming councils to ﬁll
the power vacuum left by Hadi’s
resignation until a longer term
settlement can be agreed.
Yemen’s stability is particularly important to Saudi Arabia
as it borders the world’s top oil
exporter. Yemen is also ﬁghting
one of the most powerful branches
of Al Qaeda, with the help of US
drone strikes.
Demonstrations have been
taking place in Yemen since
the Houthis overran the capital
Sanaa in September.
REUTERS
AFP
Houthis give 3 days to solve crisis
political factions trying to agree
on a way out of the standoff.
Talks have been revolving
around either persuading Hadi
to rescind his resignation or to
form a presidential council to run
the country for an interim period.
But no deal has been reached.
One of the proposals of the
powerful Shia party was to form
a presidential council, a national
council and a government, sources
who took part in conference of
Houthis said. “The political factions have been given three days
to come out with a solution that
ﬁll the vacuum; otherwise the
revolutionary committees will
handle the situation and the
transition period,” according to
has been especially shocking
for the country. Many braved
Tokyo’s chilly streets to pick up
the Yomiuri newspaper’s special
supplement about the Goto video
yesterday. “It’s scary — they (the
militants) are saying they’ll target Japanese people now,” said
21-year-old university student
Kyosuke Kamogawa. “That sends
chills down my spine.”
World leaders reacted with
outrage to the video, with US
President Barack Obama leading international condemnation
of the “heinous murder”.
RIYADH: A woman who cofounded the Saudi Liberal
Network Internet discussion
group with blogging activist
Raef Badawi has been freed
after about three months
in prison, her daughter said
yesterday.
Suad Al Shammari had spent
around 90 days at a women’s
prison in the Red Sea city of
Jeddah, her daughter Sarah Al
Rimaly said. “She’s released now,
thanks be to God,” Rimaly said.
She added that her mother was
freed three days ago after signing
a pledge “to reduce her activities”.
She was arrested in late
October for insulting Islam, activists said at the time.
Shammari, who had posted
comments on Twitter about religious leaders, could not immediately be reached for comment.
Rimaly said her mother is ﬁne
but has been “suffering from a
lack of nutrients” because she
depends on a special diet. “She’s
recovering now,” her daughter
said. Saudi Arabia’s new King
Salman late on Thursday issued
an amnesty for some prisoners,
but Rimaly said her mother’s
release was unconnected to this.
Rimaly added that she does
not think the amnesty will cover
Badawi, who is serving a 10-year
jail sentence for insulting Islam.
He was also ordered to receive
1,000 lashes, a punishment which
has drawn worldwide outrage
and been dismissed as “cruel and
inhuman” by UN human rights
chief Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein.
Army and police ofﬁcers loyal to the Houthi movement shout slogans during a gathering in Sana’a yesterday.
SANA’A: Yemen’s dominant
Houthi movement yesterday
gave political factions three
days to agree a way out of a crisis that led to the resignation of
President Abd-Rabbu Mansour
Hadi before the group imposes
its own solution.
Yemen has been in political
limbo since Hadi and the government of Prime Minister Khaled
Bahah resigned less than two
weeks ago after the Houthis
seized the presidential palace and
conﬁned the head of state to his
residence in a struggle to tighten
control over Yemen.
The Houthis, Shi’ite Muslim
rebels turned power brokers, have
been holding talks with major
believe it’s highly probable” the
video is authentic, government
spokesman Yoshihide Suga told
reporters. “I can’t ﬁnd the words
to describe how I feel about my
son’s very sad death,” a sobbing
Junko Ishido, Goto’s mother, told
reporters. His brother Junichi
Goto said he had been holding
out hope, “but that’s not possible
any more”.
Ofﬁcially paciﬁst Japan has
long avoided getting embroiled
in Middle East conﬂicts and is
rarely the target of religious
extremism, so the hostage crisis
“Through his reporting, Mr
Goto courageously sought to convey the plight of the Syrian people to the outside world,” Obama
said. A spokesman for UN chief
Ban Ki-moon said the “barbaric
murder... underscores the violence that so many have been
subjected to in Iraq and Syria”.
Berlin, Paris and London also
denounced the video, with British
Prime Minister David Cameron
saying it was “a further reminder
that (IS) is the embodiment of
evil, with no regard for human
life”.
AFP
KUWAIT CITY: Kuwait’s lower court yesterday sentenced a stateless activist for ﬁve years in jail for allegedly insulting the ruler of
the Gulf state, his lawyer said. Khaled Al Kafeefa said that defendant Abdullah Al Enezi, who has apparently ﬂed the country, was not
present in court for the ruling.
Enezi was arrested in February last year for taking part in a gathering for stateless people, locally known as bidoons, to demand Kuwaiti
citizenship and charged with insulting the emir.
Criticising the emir in Kuwait is considered a state security offence,
with those found guilty faced with up to ﬁve years behind bars.
Enezi was detained for three months before being released on a $1,700
bail (¤1,500) and banned from travel, the lawyer said.
But Kafeefa said he has learned that Enezi had ﬂed Kuwait and
sought political asylum in a Western country.
Human Rights Watch called on Kuwait in April to investigate allegations of police torture of Enezi and two other stateless men detained
for taking part in protests. Yesterday, the Kuwaiti court also acquitted 36 bidoons who had been accused of taking part in an unlicenced
demonstration and assaulting police, Kafeefa said.
But a lower court on Thursday sentenced six stateless men to one
year in jail to be followed by deportation for allegedly taking part in
an unlicenced gathering and assaulting police.
The court asked ﬁve of them to pay each $700 to suspend the jail
term, but refused to extend the exemption to the sixth defendant,
leading stateless rights activist Abdulhakim Al Fadhli.
All the rulings can be challenged. The bidoons were born and raised
in Kuwait and claim the right to Kuwaiti citizenship. But the government says only 34,000 of an estimated 110,000 stateless qualify for
consideration and that the rest hold other nationalities.
Six UN contractors freed in Sudan
SOFIA: Six Bulgarian contractors for the UN World Food
Programme (WFP) who were held for a week by Sudan rebels were
freed yesterday, the Bulgarian foreign ministry said. “The operation
for liberating them ended. The six are in a safe place,” ministry spokeswoman Betina Zhoteva said. “The operation was performed in coordination between the Bulgarian government and the WFP. No ransom
was paid and the case was not considered a kidnapping,” she added.
The three crew and three Heli Air Services company ofﬁcials were
ﬂying their UN-marked helicopter from South Sudan to the Sudanese
capital Khartoum for maintenance last Monday when they made what
the WFP called an “unexpected landing” in the southern Sudanese
region of South Kordofan. The reasons for the landing were unclear.
AFP
MIDDLE EAST
Fahmy’s deportation in
its ﬁnal stage: Report
Baher’s family hopes for presidential pardon
OTTAWA/CAIRO: Aljazeera
journalist Mohamed Fahmy is
expected to be released from an
Egyptian prison within days, a
security ofﬁcial said.
The ofﬁcial said paperwork
work was being completed that
would allow authorities to deport
Fahmy to Canada.
Canadian government also said
yesterday it remained “very hopeful” that a Canadian-Egyptian
Aljazeera reporter jailed by Egypt
would be released soon, following the freeing of his Australian
colleague. Egypt deported fellow
Aljazeera reporter Peter Greste
to his native Australia yesterday
after holding him for more than
400 days.
“We welcome these positive
developments,” Canadian Foreign
Minister John Baird’s ofﬁce said
in a statement. “We remain very
hopeful that Mr Fahmy’s case will
be resolved shortly.”
Baird’s ofﬁce said the Canadian
government was working closely
with Egypt to secure the freedom of Mohamed Fahmy, who
was detained along with Greste
and Egyptian producer Baher
Mohamed in December 2013.
The trio was convicted of
aiding the blacklisted Muslim
Brotherhood and defaming Egypt,
and sentenced to between seven
and 10 years in prison, in a move
that elicited global condemnation.
Baird visited Egypt in midJanuary seeking Fahmy’s release.
Baird and Lynne Yelich, minister of state for consular affairs,
“have raised concerns regarding
Mr Fahmy’s case with their counterparts and will continue to do so.”
Australian Peter Greste, who
Baher Mohamed (left) and Mohamed Fahmy
was freed from an Egyptian
prison and deported yesterday, is
a seasoned foreign correspondent who has covered conﬂicts in
Afghanistan and the Middle East.
Greste, who turned 49 in jail,
worked for several news organisations including Reuters and the
BBC before joining Aljazeera’s
English news channel.
He was the BBC’s Kabul correspondent in 1995, where he
watched the Taliban emerge, and
he returned after the US-led
invasion in 2001.
Since 2009, he was based in
Nairobi from where he covered
the Horn of Africa, winning the
broadcasting industry’s prestigious Peabody Award in 2011 for
the documentary, “Somalia: Land
of Anarchy”. Constantly on the
road on reporting assignments,
Sydney-born Greste has also
served in Bosnia and headed the
BBC’s South American operations
from Mexico. “From a young age,
Peter Greste had an adventurous
spirit and a strong send of social
justice and fairness,” his supporters said on the campaigning website www.freepetergreste.org.
Arrested in December 2013,
Greste was sentenced to seven
years in prison along with a fellow Aljazeera reporter, CanadianEgyptian Mohamed Fahmy, for
allegedly aiding the blacklisted
Muslim Brotherhood group.
An Egyptian colleague, Baher
Mohamed, was sentenced to 10
years. In January, a court ordered
a retrial, before President Abdel
Fattah Al Sisi passed a law making Greste and Fahmy eligible
for deportation. Dual national
Fahmy, 40, had only been named
head of Aljazeera’s Cairo ofﬁce
in September 2013, three months
before his arrest.
Born in Cairo, his parents
emigrated to Canada in 1991 and
settled in Quebec. He graduated in business administration
MONDAY 2 FEBRUARY 2015
www.thepeninsulaqatar.com
07
Freed reporter Greste
‘immensely relieved’
SYDNEY: Australian Aljazeera
reporter Peter Greste (pictured), was “immensely relieved”
and “desperate to come home”
after being freed from more than
400 days in detention in Egypt,
Foreign Minister Julie Bishop
said yesterday.
“I spoke to Peter Greste shortly
after his release and before he
departed Egypt,” she told reporters in Sydney, the Australian
Associated Press reported. “He was
immensely relieved and he was desperate to come home to Australia
and reunite with his family.”
Greste was in Cyprus and was
met by consular ofﬁcials after leaving Cairo with his brother on an
EgyptAir ﬂight to Larnaca.
“We moved as fast as we could to
make arrangements for his immediate departure,” Bishop said, with
the situation having developed quickly. “He will make his way home
in his own time,” she added.
“He wants a bit of rest and recreation and to be re-united with
friends and family as soon as possible.”
Bishop said Australia had “worked very hard behind the scenes,
working directly with the Egyptian government”.
Greste had said that the support he received had helped him
through his time in prison, she said. “From my discussion with
him, he was very keen to be back on a beach and lying in the sun in
Australia,” the report quoted Bishop as saying.
AFP
from Vancouver University. With
the 2003 US-led invasion of Iraq,
he worked as an interpreter
for the Los Angeles Times, and
the next year Fahmy wrote “An
Interpreter’s Chronicles of the
Iraq War”.
He went on to work for Gulf
television stations and then
the International Committee
of the Red Cross. In 2011, CNN
employed him to cover the Arab
Spring revolt in Egypt which toppled longtime president Hosni
Mubarak and then he went on to
work as a freelancer for the BBC.
He will return with his ﬁance to
Canada where they now plan to get
married “right away”, his brother
Adel Fahmy said last year.
Baher Mohamed’s family,
for their part, hope for a presidential pardon. He covered the
Arab Spring revolts in Libya,
Yemen and Egypt. Mohamed
had worked as a freelancer for a
Japanese publication before joining Aljazeera in mid-2013. Aged
30, he has a daughter and three
sons, the youngest of whom, now
ﬁve months old, was born while
Mohamed was behind bars.
“Baher was always in the thick
of all the violence in Egypt... He
always wanted to relay the truth
himself, rather than rely on other
sources,” brother Assem said.
AGENCIES
Tunisia’s Islamist
party Ennahda
agrees to join
coalition govt
TUNIS: Tunisia’s moderate
Islamist party Ennahda has
agreed to join its main rival
secular party Nidaa Tounes as
part of a coalition government,
party leaders said yesterday.
The deal came after Tunisian
Prime Minister-designate Habib
Essid’s new cabinet faced a threat
of rejection in parliament last
week from key parties including
Ennahda, because they opposed
his choice of ministers.
The agreement could bolster
stability in Tunisia, which is just
emerging from its transition to
full democracy four years after
the uprising that ousted autocrat Zine El Abidine Ben Ali. The
prime minister had announced a
government without any cabinet
posts for moderate Islamists.
Despite tensions and a political crisis that almost ended its
transition, Tunisian politics has
been dominated by compromises
between secular and Islamist
leaders to help keep the North
African country on track.
“Ennahda will participate in
the government... the future looks
good,” Rached Ghannouchi, head
of Ennahda, told reporters after
meeting with Essid yesterday,
without giving more details.
The premier will likely
announce his new cabinet today
before it goes to parliament for
ratiﬁcation on Wednesday.
The leader of liberal Afek
Tounes party, Yassin Brahim, told
reporters yesterday the new
government will include Nidaa
Tounes, Afek Tounes, ULP party
and Ennahda. Two party sources
said Ennahda will provide two
cabinet ministers and two state
ministers in the new government. Ennahda, with the second largest number of seats in
the assembly, had sought a unity
government.
AGENCIES
Cop held for killing hospitalised Islamist
Egyptian journalists participate in a silent protest against militancy and in solidarity with the victims of an attack
on the military that led to at least 30 deaths, in Cairo yesterday.
Ahmadinejad launches
website ahead of polls
TEHRAN: Iran’s former president Mahmoud
Ahmadinejad yesterday launched his ofﬁcial website,
in a possible return to the political scene a year before
legislative elections.
The site Ahmadinejad.ir, showing Ahmadinejad with
a big smile, was launched at the same time as a Google+
page for the two-time former president and an account
on Instagram. The hardline conservative has stayed out of
the public eye since his mandate ended in June 2013 and
the election of Hassan Rowhani, his moderate successor
as president of the Islamic republic.
Last month, Mohammad Reza Rahimi, Iran’s ﬁrst vice
president under Ahmadinejad, was sentenced to ﬁve years
in prison, state media said. The supreme court’s verdict
came after a long-running trial on what Iranian media
said were corruption charges.
Ahmadinejad has said the charges against Rahimi
stemmed from before the time he was named vice
president.
1,375 killed in Iraq in January
BAGHDAD: Violence in Iraq killed 1,375 people in
January, month eight of the battle against jihadists who
swept through large areas of the country last summer,
the United Nations said yesterday.
“A total of 1,375 Iraqis were killed and another 2,240
were wounded in acts of terrorism and violence in
January,” the UN Assistance Mission for Iraq said.
UNAMI said at least 1,101 people were killed in
December, capping the most violent year for Iraq since
2007, when sectarian bloodshed between the Shiite majority and Sunni Arab minority was at its peak.
The UN mission cautioned that the real toll could be
higher as the conﬂict between Iraqi forces and the Islamic
State group had hampered efforts to verify casualty information. “UNAMI has also received, without being able to
verify, reports of large numbers of casualties along with
unknown numbers of persons who have died from secondary effects of violence.”
AFP
CAIRO: An Egyptian policeman was arrested yesterday for
having shot dead an Islamist
detained in a Cairo hospital
with injuries from his arrest,
the interior ministry said.
The ministry, on its Facebook
page, said the victim was a member of the outlawed Muslim
Brotherhood arrested as he tried
to plant a bomb in the capital’s
Al Warraq district, without giving a date.
The suspect had insulted and
provoked his police guard in hospital, threatening to kill him. The
enraged policeman had shot him
dead, it said. The ministry said
the policeman was arrested and
an investigation opened.
Egyptian authorities have regularly accused the Brotherhood
of launching deadly attacks
since the army ousted president Mohamed Mursi in 2013,
a charge denied by the Islamist
movement.
Tensions soared after deadly
clashes between protesters and
security forces in Cairo and the
northern city of Alexandria on
January 25 as Egypt marked the
fourth anniversary of the 2011
uprising that toppled ex-strongman Hosni Mubarak.
Police arrested 516 Brotherhood
supporters that day.
On Thursday, militants targeted security forces with rockets
and a car bomb in North Sinai
province, in simultaneous attacks
that cost at least 30 lives.
Militants based in Sinai region,
which has a border with Gaza,
have killed hundreds of police
and soldiers since Mursi’s political demise.
AFP
08
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Editorial
Cartoon Arts International / The New York Times Syndicate
A dastardly act
HE beheading of a second Japanese citizen by the
Islamic State has shocked the world, especially the
Japanese. That a peace-loving country like Japan should
lose two of its citizens to a terrorist organisation is
depressing. But this is a war that cannot be won with sympathy
and tears. The dastardly execution of Kenji Goto, a Japanese
journalist being held by the Islamic State in Syria, shows that
the world needs to be ruthless against this terrorist organization
and it must be defeated before they are able to extinguish
another innocent life. Goto’s killing follows that of another
Japanese citizen Haruna Yukawa by militants last week.
Across Japan, people reacted with horror to Goto’s death. For
ordinary Japanese, the murder has brought the distant conﬂict
in the Middle East closer home. The country still has a paciﬁst
constitution prohibiting it from involvement in foreign conﬂicts.
Shinzo Abe, the conservative prime minister who has been
trying to put the country on a more “normal” footing and relax
the post-World War II restrictions on the military, said he was
“infuriated by these inhumane and despicable acts of terrorism.”
“Japan will never give in to terrorism,” he said. “We will further
expand our humanitarian assistance in the Middle East in areas
such as food and medical care. Japan will steadfastly fulﬁll
its responsibility in the international community combating
terrorism.”
The murder of Japanese was meant to intimidate Tokyo into
withdrawing from the global ﬁght
against terrorism. The hostage crisis
The world
began three days after Abe, on a
must act before visit to the Middle East, announced
$200m in aid for countries who were
the Islamic
helping refugees from the Islamic
The initial ransom demand
State is able to State.
for Goto and Yukawa was for exactly
kidnap another this amount.
The world has condemned the
innocent
attack on Japanese and expressed
solidarity with the Japanese people.
human being.
President Barack Obama issued
a statement that condemning the
“heinous murder of Japanese citizen and journalist Kenji Goto.”
“We stand today in solidarity with Prime Minister Abe and the
Japanese people in denouncing this barbaric act,” the President
said. “We applaud Japan’s steadfast commitment to advancing
peace and prosperity in the Middle East and globally, including
its generous assistance for innocent people affected by the
conﬂicts in the region.”
At the same time, the Islamic State terrorists are still holding
a Jordanian pilot hostage. Jordanian ofﬁcials said yesterday they
were still ready to hand over a jailed Iraqi militant to Islamic
State in a swap deal if a captured Jordanian pilot was released.
Jordan’s security agencies were making constant checks to
see whether the pilot, Muath Al Kasaesbeh, was still alive.
Kasaesbeh was captured in December after his F-16 ﬁghter jet
crashed in territory controlled by the militants in Syria.
The IS is already on the retreat, and the world needs to make
fatal blows so that this terrorist organization doesn’t kidnap
another human being again
T
.
Next American century
BY DAVID H PETRAEUS and
MICHAEL O’HANLON
HORT-TERM
economic
trends in the United States are
encouraging. Unemployment is
down, growth is up, deﬁcits are
less than half what they were during
the “Great Recession,” gas prices have
plummeted, citizens have “deleveraged”
their debt considerably and consumer
sentiment is very positive.
For many, however, these realities
are merely a soothing veneer over a
troubled picture. They see America
in decline, the middle class adrift, the
world in shambles and political acrimony more entrenched than ever over
issues ranging from immigration and
US policy on Iran and Cuba to taxes
and health care. This pessimism is not
limited to the home front. With major
US allies in Europe and East Asia
enduring sustained economic malaise,
worrisome demographics and declining
power, many believe the Western world
is in retreat.
Those sentiments are generally unfounded,
however, when
it comes to the
United States and
North America.
Recent positive
headlines have not
masked deeper
problems so much
as they have heralded the kind of
future this nation
can enjoy — especially if political
leaders can make
a few sensible,
non-Herculean
compromises on
issues that beg
attention.
The
United
States is, in
fact, better positioned than any
other country
for the next 20
to 30 years — and, very likely, beyond.
Together with Canada and Mexico, the
United States also enjoys mutually reinforcing sources of competitive advantages in geopolitics, demographics,
energy and natural resources, manufacturing and industrial competitiveness
S
With major
US allies in
Europe and East
Asia enduring
sustained
economic
malaise,
worrisome
demographics
and declining
power, many
believe the
Western world is
in retreat.
and, above all, innovation and technology. If the 20th century was the
American Century, the 21st is poised
to be the North American Century.
Since we ﬁrst offered this view some
two years ago in The Post, a number of
favorable trends have solidiﬁed or even
accelerated:
— The United States is now the
world’s largest producer of both oil liquids and natural gas, with Canada and
Mexico important players in the energy
arena, as well.
— US manufacturing, while still far
from its heyday, has added hundreds
of thousands of jobs over the past two
years, and Mexico is now fully competitive with China and other Asian manufacturing hubs in a variety of industries.
— The United States leads the world
in high-tech sectors such as aerospace
and pharmaceuticals.
— The US federal budget deﬁcit,
while still too high, is below 3 percent
of gross domestic product, and publicly
held debt as a fraction of the GDP has
stabilized at around 75 percent.
— Relative to GDP, US household
debt is down signiﬁcantly from preGreat Recession levels.
— US small business conﬁdence is the
highest it has been in nine years, and
consumer conﬁdence is at its highest
in 11 years.
— Crime rates in America are the
lowest in a generation.
— America’s demographics are far
and away the healthiest among the
developed economies, as well as Russia,
China and India, with a nice and steady
1 percent annual population growth
rate.
— The US military, while under budgetary strain and still in harm’s way, has
weathered not only the brunt of wars in
Iraq and Afghanistan but also the ax of
“sequestration” and downward pressure
on budgets for half a decade.
— The United States and Germany
are, according to the World Economic
Forum, neck and neck in respective
claims to be the world’s most competitive major economy. US strengths in
market size, entrepreneurial culture
and ﬁnancial networks roughly equal
Germany’s strengths in modern manufacturing and social cohesion.
— US GDP growth is now exceeding
3 percent. Indeed, at present it appears
that the US economy may, for the ﬁrst
time in some nine years, grow more in
absolute dollar terms than China’s does.
The other side
M
action. The impact of his words would
have been stronger, of course, had
he done more since he ﬁrst pledged
stronger action on domestic violence
when in opposition four years ago; and
had he not reduced funding for support
services in government; and had he not
been distracted by leadership blunders
such as Prince Philip’s knighthood.
His message would have been
strengthened, too, had the Abbott
women been alongside him and spoken from their perspective.
Nonetheless, at least Mr Abbott is
trying again to transform public perceptions by humanising the problem.
Too often domestic violence is
regarded as an easily dismissed statistic. Australians need to be shocked
into action. The public has to see that
domestic violence – be it through rage,
devious planning, mental manipulation,
simple misogyny, alcohol abuse, mental
illness and or just plain disrespect of fellow humans – can hit home anywhere,
at any time.
Abbott’s choice of domestic violence
victim, grieving mother and Australian
of the Year Rosie Batty to lead an advisory panel to the Council of Australian
Governments is sensible. The harrowing story of her abusive marriage
and tragic murder of her son Luke by
his father last February touched all
WP-BLOOMBERG
Quote of
the day
Tony Abbott’s options to tackle domestic violence
ANY people take what
Tony Abbott says about
women and families with a
handful of salt. The Herald
understands that. But the Prime
Minister might just have revealed the
most telling, empathetic and important
insight of his prime ministership.
“I’m the father of three daughters
and the brother of three sisters,” Mr
Abbott said this week as he conﬁrmed
his commitment to tackle domestic violence. “The last thing I want to see is
violence against women and children.”
Too often domestic violence is
regarded as an easily dismissed statistic. Australians need to be shocked into
(China’s growth rate, though declining,
is likely to be nearly twice as fast; however, as measured in classic terms, its
GDP is still only a bit over half as large
as our own.)
This last point is crucial. China has
recorded historic achievements, but
its ascent to superpowerdom is not a
given. Leaving aside the limited appeal
of China’s political and economic model,
it faces the imperatives of transitioning from a low-cost labor provider to
a value-added and services economy,
reducing the world’s largest debt-toGDP ratio, cutting pollution and corruption, dealing with insufﬁciently
competitive state-owned enterprises
and addressing numerous other
domestic challenges. In fact, Brookings
Institution scholar David Dollar has
argued that, even if China overtakes the
United States in absolute GDP within
a couple of decades, the United States
may regain the top spot later in the
century, especially if China’s political
model remains autocratic.
There is, of course, much that the
United States needs to do. We need
comprehensive immigration reform.
Our education system is highly uneven
in quality and requires an overhaul to
prepare students for the economy of
the future. Our lower and middle economic classes have seen minimal real
wage growth since the Great Recession.
Crime is still high by Western standards. And the US deﬁcit will get worse
again within a half-decade or so if
nothing is done on entitlement spending and tax reform. Beyond that, our
infrastructure — which is central to
future productivity gains — needs major
improvement. And, of course, climate
changes remain a threat, as do Islamic
extremist groups and Iran, as well as
Russia.
Regardless, more than any nation
on Earth, and arguably more than any
in history, the United States has the
assets needed to confront its problems
head-on. Indeed, however our nation’s
political parties differ on a variety of
issues, Democrats and Republicans
should agree on one proposition: This
is another American century, and the
future has seldom looked brighter.
Washington policymakers do not need
to rescue the nation from the precipice
so much as to make reasonable, midsize compromises on a number of policies and otherwise get out of the way.
Australians. Already Ms Batty has done
much to help save more women – and
men – from harm.
Each week one woman in Australia
dies as a result of violence committed by a partner or former partner.
Researchers say this makes Australia
per capita a far more dangerous place
for women trying to escape violent men
than England and Wales. One in three
Australian women has suffered violence
in their lifetime. One in six women has
experienced violence by a partner.
One in four young Australians (aged
12 to 20 years) are aware of domestic
violence against their mother or stepmother. The Sydney Morning Herald
There is not an hour
in the day that me
and the armed forces
are not working on
this, our hero the
pilot. Unfortunately
the war today is one
within the Islamic
world and it’s our
war.
King Abdullah II
Jordian King
MONDAY 2 FEBRUARY 2015
www.thepeninsulaqatar.com
VIEWS
09
Greece’s PM sticks to tough line, for now
In fewer than seven days, Prime Minister Alexis
Tsipras’s administration in Athens has halted several
planned privatisations, started debt relief talks, took
European partners to task over Russian sanctions and
held a tough line with the ﬁrst eurozone ofﬁcial to visit
the country after last Sunday’s elections.
BY COSTAS PITAS
HILE it sent
conﬂicting
m e s s a ge s ,
G r e e c e ’s
new leftwing government spent most of its ﬁrst
week signalling determination to
take the hard-line, anti-bailout
stance that international investors
and European leaders had feared.
In fewer than seven days, Prime
Minister Alexis Tsipras’s administration in Athens has halted
several planned privatisations,
started debt relief talks, took
European partners to task over
Russian sanctions and held a
tough line with the ﬁrst eurozone
ofﬁcial to visit the country after
last Sunday’s elections.
Athens ﬁnally ended the week
on a conciliatory note as Tsipras
called the European Central Bank
chief to assure him that the government wanted an accord with
its creditors.
But that message of moderation has been largely drowned out
by the blizzard of policy moves
over the past week aimed at
rolling back the current bailout
deal, which helped push stocks in
Greek banks down 40 percent in
just three days.
A ﬁrst, more concrete test, of
how Greece wants to position
itself within the European Union,
including the countries that
W
have been paying for its ¤240bn
($270bn) bailout, comes in the
next few days, however.
Finance Minister Yanis
Varoufakis travels to Paris ﬁrst
then on to London on Monday and
Rome on Tuesday. Tsipras will
join his ﬁnance minister in Rome,
and meets French President
Francois Hollande on Wednesday.
The reception in other European
capitals may end up being cooler
than back home where Tsipras’
left-wing party Syriza clocked up
a resounding win in a January 25
snap election.
In Paris and Rome, in particular, intrigued anticipation for a government that might help push a
growth agenda in Europe has over
the past few days turned to near
indignation. “It’s okay to talk about
Greek debt, to lighten its burden.
It is not okay to cancel Greek debt,
because that would mean passing
on the burden to French taxpayers,” French Finance Minister
Michel Sapin, said.
Analysts say the government’s
hard rhetoric may yet change
when the administration is confronted with the country’s ﬁnancial situation. Syriza says cash
reserves are enough to meet
obligations of ¤3.5bn over the
February-March period but a further total of ¤1.5bn in principal
and interest fall due in June with
further payments of ¤4.7bn in July
and ¤3.6bn in August. “On whatever incurs a cost to the public
ﬁnances, I expect to see moderation,” said Dimitri Spiropoulos,
associate professor of politics at
the University of Athens.
In the past week, Greek cabinet members have promised to
reinstate collective bargaining for
workers, reverse pension cuts and
raise the minimum wage.
Those measures had been taken
by the previous government as a
way to save money. The new government said it was also scrapping the privatisation of power
grid ADMIE, the country’s largest port Piraeus OLP and planned
sale of its stake in the biggest
reﬁnery Hellenic Petroleum..
Yet even the freeze on privatisation may be temporary, said
Spiropoulos, who expected Tsipras
to “re-examine all the privatisations again with new terms.”
Indeed, despite the bold
announcements, there have also
been some signs of moderation.
On Friday, for example,
Varoufakis batted away Eurogroup
head Jeroen Dijsselbloem, saying Athens would not extend
its bailout past the planned end
date of February 28, and would
not cooperate with a mission
from the lending “troika” of the
EU, European Central Bank and
International Monetary Fund.
Yet in other quarters,
Varoufakis has struck a much
softer tone, seeking foreign
investment and saying Greece will
not overspend.
Greece’s Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras (right) with Eurogroup President Jeroen Dijsselbloem during their meeting
in Athens, Greece.
“We favour a frugal life. We
don’t believe that growth comes
from having so many Porsche
Cayennes on our narrow city
streets,” said Varoufakis.
In a tweet on Saturday, he urged
“journalists scurrilously portraying me as anti-German” to read a
2013 post titled ‘Europe Needs a
Hegemonic Germany’ in which he
said Germany should play a bigger
role in creating demand for other
countries’ products.
But there is still room for surprises. After Syriza had made
Greece’s bailout the centre of its
campaign, few expected a spat
between Athens and its European
partners over Russia last week.
One of Tsipras’ ﬁrst face-toface meetings after taking ofﬁce
was with Russia’s ambassador
to Greece. Barely 24 hours after
the meeting, he complained to the
EU’s foreign policy chief about the
For Jeb Bush, the front-runner
status comes with caveats
BY KAREN TUMULTY
and MATEA GOLD
ITT Romney’s decision to
forgo a third try at the White
House has settled the question of whether the 2016
GOP presidential ﬁeld has a
front-runner — bestowing a coveted status on
former Florida Governor Jeb Bush (pictured)
that also raises new challenges and perils.
Republicans have a tradition of picking an
anointed one early. That establishment candidate almost always ends up with the nomination, although not without a ﬁght and some
speed bumps along the way.
But this is a particularly unsettled time for
the party. It is struggling to deﬁne its identity
amid open warfare among its various factions.
And there are a raft of fresh and potentially
appealing faces emerging on the scene, comprising what many Republicans believe could
be the strongest undercard of early-bout contenders in decades.
Losing Romney as a rival is “a mixed bag
for Bush,” said veteran GOP strategist Saul
Anuzis, a former chairman of the Michigan
Republican party. “He also becomes the target
of everyone who is anti-establishment. Before,
you had Romney and Bush kind of splitting
up that ire.” Bush was already assembling a
formidable army of fundraisers and talented
operatives, including poaching Romney’s
top Iowa strategist, David Kochel, to be his
national campaign manager.
That process appears to be intensifying
after the 2012 GOP presidential nominee
bowed out on Friday. “It’s a great day for Jeb
Bush,” said Brian Ballard, a lobbyist who led
Romney’s 2012 fundraising effort in Florida
and switched to Bush this time around. “I
think Jeb had 75 percent of the money folks
here. This brings in the other 25 percent.”
Chicago private-equity executive Bill
Kunkler and his wife, Susan Crown, had been
top fundraisers for Romney in the last election and had expected to be there again for
him in 2016. Now, Bush is “the only one my
wife and I will work for,” Kunkler said. “If it’s
not Jeb, we’re done for this cycle. I know in
my heart that Jeb is the only one who passes
the presidential test. We’ll be all in for him.”
But there will be plenty of competition for
the big funders who built the massive Bank
of Mitt in 2012. Virginia fundraiser Bobbie
Kilberg, who with her husband, Bill Kilberg,
raised more than $4m for Romney, said they
had committed to help him again if he ran.
M
Now, she will support New Jersey Gov. Chris
Christie — and bring as many other donors
over as she can.
Still, “we shouldn’t assume that the only
people competing for the centre-right pie will
be Jeb and Chris. I don’t think any of the prospective candidates will be shy about going
after these donors. It’s a race between everyone,” said Kilberg, who cited former Texas
Gov. Rick Perry, Sen Rand Paul, R-Ky, and
Wisconsin Gov Scott Walker as also making
strong appeals.
Marshaling resources, however, is not the
only challenge for Bush that may have been
heightened with Romney’s decision not to run.
“It raises expectations in kind of an unrealistic
way,” said one member of the former Florida
governor’s nascent campaign team, who did not
want to be identiﬁed discussing his strategy.
Bush’s biggest challenge — and now, arguably, his most urgent — is to deﬁne himself
for an electorate whose impression of him has
been shaped largely by the last name that he
shares with two former presidents, his father
and his brother.
That is not an unalloyed asset at a moment
when many Republicans are looking to turn
the page politically and are intrigued by relative newcomers. Walker, who was a big hit at
a conservative gathering in Iowa last weekend,
led a tight ﬁeld in a Des Moines Register/
Bloomberg Politics poll of that state’s caucusgoers released on Saturday. Christie can boast
of a landslide 2013 re-election in a heavily
Democratic state. Another potential candidate
is Bush’s fellow Floridian, the charismatic Sen
Marco Rubio.
The former governor also does not have
a strong connection with elements of the
grass-roots base of his party, as do such ﬁgures
as tea party favorite Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas,
libertarian Paul, or social-issue warriors such
as former Arkansas Gov Mike Huckabee and
former Pennsylvania Sen Rick Santorum.
Bush himself last ran for public ofﬁce more
than 12 years ago — in the middle of his brother’s
ﬁrst term, before the launch of the Iraq war and
at a time when the ﬁrst iPhone was nearly ﬁve
years in the future. (He does fancy himself a
technology buff; his ofﬁcial portrait as governor
features him standing beside a bookshelf, on
which a BlackBerry rests in its charger.)
As the front-runner, he and his record are
guaranteed to come under more scrutiny.
Two questions about Bush will be answered
only by running: Will he be able to build a
state-of-the-art campaign operation for a digital age? And does he have the retail political
skills to prevail in early states such as Iowa
and New Hampshire, which are a repetitive grind of town hall meetings, living-room
receptions and candidate forums?
Bush expects his rivals to paint him as a
moderate, given his positions on issues that
enﬂame the GOP base, including his support
for a path to legalisation for the undocumented immigrants and for Common Core.
Conservatives, libertarians and even some liberals have criticized the K-12 academic standards in math and reading as undermining local
control of education.
Bush believes he can run as an unabashedly
conservative, free-market Republican without
backing away from stances that have rankled
the right. What will truly differentiate him,
they vow, is his determination to run on a
positive message that resonates with a broad
audience nationally.
Among the themes he will emphasize are
middle-class wage stagnation, upward mobility for those trapped at the bottom and outreach to minority communities that could hold
the key to GOP hopes of winning in 2016. He
named his political action committee “Right to
Rise,” a slogan borrowed from Rep. Paul Ryan,
R-Wis., who was Romney’s 2012 running mate.
Bush will go to Michigan on Wednesday
to road-test his pitch before the Detroit
Economic Club, which is known as a venue
where presidential candidates of both parties
go to showcase their policy bona ﬁdes. But
Bush advisers say his appearance in a heavily
Democratic, economically devastated city is
also designed to send another message — that
he believes he is the Republican best equipped
to compete across the map.
WP-BLOOMBERG
wording of the European Union’s
joint statement on sanctions.
Tspiras said Athens had not been
consulted.
“Greece has no interest in
imposing sanctions on Russia. We
have no differences with Russia
and the Russian people,” Energy
Minister Panagiotis Lafazanis
added on Wednesday as Athens
appeared to harden its stance
against Russian sanctions. A day
later, Tsipras’s government ended up
supporting the extension of existing
sanctions. The reason behind the
apparent ﬂip-ﬂop remains unclear.
Some analysts said Athens may
ultimately aim to use Russian sanctions as a bargaining tool in its debt
repayment negotiations with other
European capitals.
Raoul Ruparel, Head of
Economic Research at the
London-based think tank Open
Europe, said the new Greek
government is clearly keen to
build closer ties with the Kremlin.
“I do think that is genuinely
their belief that Russia is an
important partner for them.”
What seems evident from
Tspiras’ ﬁrst week in ofﬁce is that
his party has been thrust onto the
international scene with little
previous experience. Syriza’s rise
to power has been steep, and has
been fuelled by wide popular desperation at six years of recession.
The party has gone from less
than ﬁve percent of the vote in
2009 elections to more than 35
percent on Sunday, ending 40
years of politics dominated by the
two big parties of the centre right
and centre left. Cries of “We love
you Alexi” are heard in Athens in
front of the prime minister’s residence and change has also come
from symbolic steps taken by the
new administration. REUTERS
Boko Haram is just as
vicious. Why does IS
get all the headlines?
BY CHARLOTTE LYTTON
MERICANS are obsessed with the Islamic State. Ninetyone percent see the terrorist group as a threat to the vital
interests of the United States, according to a September
Washington PostABC News poll . That same month, President US
Barack Obama called the Islamic State one of the greatest terrorist
threats facing the country. “These are barbarians,” House Speaker
John Boehner, an Ohio Republican,told ABC News later that month.
“They intend to kill us. And if we don’t destroy them ﬁrst, we’re
going to pay the price.”
Yet the African Islamists of Boko Haram are just as deadly as their
Middle Eastern counterparts. And few Americans are paying attention. News outlets chronicle the Islamic State’s every bloody move.
Between January 1 and January 28, America’s 24 most popular news
sites published 3,293 articles that mentioned the group, according to an
analysis for The Washington Post run by Whitney Erin Boesel of Media
Cloud, a joint project of Harvard and MIT. During that period — which
included the Baga massacre, in which Boko Haram killed as many as
2,000 Nigerian villagers — just 544 stories mentioned Boko Haram.
By membership, Boko Haram is about one-third the size the Islamic
State. But it has displaced 1.5 million Nigerian citizens, nearly as many
as the 1.8 million Iraqis displaced by the Islamic State. (The numbers
for Syria are difﬁcult to tally, but as many as 200,000 people ﬂed Kobani
in the four days after the Islamic State began attacking that city.)
The Nigerian terror force has killed 10,500 to 18,500 people since 2011,
according to the Council on Foreign Relations . Concrete numbers are
hard to come by, but experts say the Islamic State has killed at least
6,000 people in Iraq and Syria since its offensive began last year, only
a slightly higher rate with a much bigger corps.
True, the groups, and their conﬂicts, have many dissimilarities.
The Islamic State is determined to make headlines. Its ranks are full
of Western ﬁghters with a penchant for ﬂashy violence and a native
knowledge of what Western journalists cover. It boasts a slick social
media presence, uploading gruesome YouTube videos of slaughters
and mass graves. The group has beheaded at least three Americans,
and it operates in the same theatre where many US soldiers lost
their lives ﬁghting for Iraqi stability.
By contrast, the Nigerian extremists intentionally ﬂoat beneath
the radar. They’ve destroyed at least 24 base receiver stations in the
country’s northeast, hindering cellphone calls and the transmission
of photos and videos. Fewer Western reporters work in the region,
and the group hasn’t directly threatened the United States. Even
many Nigerian ofﬁcials have been silent on Boko Haram, intent on
hiding reports of homegrown terrorism. Without local media, it’s
even harder to expose the ugly truth of Boko Haram.
Still, the discrepancy in coverage reﬂects a certain hypocrisy. “Even
when America’s core interests are not directly threatened, we stand
ready to do our part to prevent mass atrocities and protect basic human
rights,” Obama told the UN General Assembly in 2013. But in reality,
we — journalists, politicians, most Westerners — worry primarily about
our own national priorities and national security. That comes at a cost.
“Boko Haram is one of the most lethal terrorist groups in the world ...
(and) the lack of coverage has disincentived an international response,”
terrorism expert Max Abrahms said. “If Boko Haram were front page
news regularly, it would be harder for the international community to
WP-BLOOMBERG
ignore that crisis.”
A
10
MONDAY 2 FEBRUARY 2015
www.thepeninsulaqatar.com
INTERNATIONAL
Deadly clashes rage in east Ukraine
Peace talks fail; 13 soldiers and 13 civilians killed
KIEV/DONETSK, Ukraine:
Fighting raged in eastern
Ukraine yesterday as Russianbacked separatists used artillery ﬁre to try to dislodge
government forces from a strategic rail hub after peace talks
collapsed.
Hopes of easing the situation
evaporated on Saturday with
Ukraine’s representative and
separatist envoys accusing the
other of sabotaging negotiations.
“Fighting continues across all
sections of the frontline,” Kiev
military spokesman Volodymyr
Polyovy said in a brieﬁng, adding
that some 13 soldiers had been
killed in the past 24 hours. Other
Ukrainian authorities said at least
13 civilians had also died in violent
attacks.
The Organisation for Security
and Cooperation in Europe, which
took part in the talks in Minsk,
Belarus, along with envoys from
Ukraine and Russia, said rebel
delegates had not been ready to
discuss key points of a peace plan.
“In fact, they were not even
prepared to discuss implementation of a ceaseﬁre and withdrawal
of heavy weapons,” the OSCE said
in a statement.
It said rebels had instead pushed
for a revision of a ceaseﬁre plan
agreed in Minsk last September.
The terms of that 12-point protocol have been repeatedly violated
but Kiev and foreign governments
see it as the only viable roadmap
to end the nine-month-long conﬂict in which more than 5,000
people have been killed.
The rebels rejected the OSCE’s
assessment, saying they were
ready for dialogue, but unwilling
to accept an “ultimatum” from
Kiev so long as government forces
continued shelling civilian areas,
separatist news service DAN
quoted rebel envoy Denis Pushilin
as saying.
In eastern Ukraine, the Kiev
military reported no let-up in
separatist attacks on government
positions.
Clashes are intense around
the town of Debaltseve, Polyovy
said, referring to a Kiev-held
transport hub connecting the
two main rebel strongholds that
separatists aim to cut off, though
the situation remained “under
control”.
The rebel advance has succeeded in seizing part of nearby
Vuhlehirsk from Kiev troops,
Polyovy said. On Sunday the town
was being pounded by near-constant shelling, a witness reported.
The Interior Ministry said on
Sunday seven civilians had been
killed in shelling yesterday of
Debaltseve, while the Luhansk
regional administration said
three civilians had been killed
in shelling across the region
overnight.
Residents are being encouraged to
abandon the areas of ﬁercest ﬁghting, where many have been living in
makeshift bomb shelters, waiting for
breaks in the bombardment to make
quick trips for food and water.
In Kiev-controlled Slaviansk,
refugees arrived in buses from
Debaltseve and other frontline
towns.
Pensioner Vyacheslav Gurov
said half of his town of Avdiivka
had been completely destroyed.
“We don’t even know who’s
shooting. Both the rebels and the
national guard are at it ... there’s
no water, no electricity, no heating, nothing,” he said.
In the rebel stronghold of
Donetsk, which shook with the
crash of artillery ﬁre throughout Sunday, the regional administration reported the deaths of
at least three civilians in shelling, describing the situation as
“extremely tense”.
A witness saw the body of a
young man stretched out on a
street in the city centre, killed
A man stands next to his car yesterday after it was destroyed by shelling in the eastern Ukrainian city of Donetsk
which is controlled by pro-Russian rebels.
when a shell struck a wall nearby.
Nadezhda Petrovna, 68, a neighbour, said the man was trying to
run away from the attack when a
shell landed in front of him.
“It is like this every day, people
are getting killed, we are sleeping fully dressed so we can run
into the cellar, this is becoming
unbearable,” she said.
Nigeria repels Boko Haram assault on Maiduguri
KANO,
Nigeria:
Nigeria’s
military yesterday repelled a
Boko Haram assault on the key
northeastern city of Maiduguri,
as violence raged across the
region just two weeks before
national elections.
The hours-long attack on the
strategic capital of Borno state
was the Islamists’ second attempt
to take Maiduguri in a week.
Separately, a suicide bomber
killed seven people in Potiskum,
the economic capital of neighbouring Yobe state, while two
blasts — one also carried out by a
suicide bomber — killed ﬁve people in Gombe city to the south.
With near-relentless violence
plaguing much of the northeast,
and Boko Haram still in control of
large swathes of the region, fears
are mounting over the prospect of
organising polls on February 14.
The opposition All Progressives
Congress (APC), which claims
to be gaining momentum in the
campaign against President
Goodluck Jonathan, has rejected
calls for the vote to be postponed.
But hundreds of thousands of
voters in the northeast, an APC
stronghold, could be disenfranchised by the unrest if the election goes ahead in two weeks.
Heavily-armed
gunmen
attacked the southern edge of
Maiduguri at roughly 3am (0200
GMT), setting off explosives as
they tried to enter the city, several residents said.
Repelled in the south by
troops backed by vigilantes, they
regrouped and tried to take the
city from the east, where they
again met stiff resistance.
As the gunbattles raged, “the
whole city (was) in fear,” said
resident Adam Krenuwa.
Defence spokesman Chris
Olukolade said the assault on the
town, where the extremist group
was founded more than a decade
ago, was “contained” and that
“the terrorists incurred massive
casualties.”
“The situation is calm as mopping up operation in the affected
area is ongoing,” he wrote in a
text message, a claim consistent
with witness reports.
Despite waves of attacks in the
city in recent months, Maiduguri
has become a place of refuge for
people forced to ﬂee other areas in
Borno that have been taken over
by the Islamist rebels.
In Potiskum, a bomber blew
himself up shortly after midday outside the home of Sabo
Garbu, who is running for a seat
in the lower house of parliament
on behalf of the ruling People’s
Democratic Party (PDP).
A bus stopped outside his home
and dropped off the attacker
before speeding away, multiple
witnesses said.
Seven people died in the blast
and seven others were injured,
a police ofﬁcer at the scene who
requested anonymity said in
an account supported by three
witnesses.
Garbu and those attending his
campaign meeting reportedly
escaped unhurt.
It not immediately clear if
the attack was the work of Boko
Haram or another group with
another motive.
Further south, two explosions
rocked the capital of Gombe state,
killing ﬁve people, witnesses and
a military source said.
The ﬁrst blast at Gombe city’s
Tsohuwar Kasuwa market killed
two people, according to witness
Muktar Abbani. The cause of the
incident was unclear.
Moments later, a suicide
bomber on a motorcycle blew
himself up at a military checkpoint, killing a soldier and two
others, said another witness,
Musa Badamasi, and a military
source who requested anonymity.
Boko Haram has carried out
dozens of bombings throughout
its six-year uprising, which has
claimed more than 13,000 lives.
Fearing the collapse of government control in areas controlled
by the Islamists, along their borders, Nigeria’s neighbours have
rallied to the ﬁght against Boko
Haram.
Chadian aircraft meanwhile
pounded the group’s positions
in the Nigerian border town of
Gamboru for a second straight
day on Sunday, a journalist
witnessed.
Loud explosions were heard
coming from the town while
local and Chadian troops and
armoured vehicles massed across
the border in the Cameroonian
town of Fotokol.
AFP
German anti-EU party
to slim down leadership
People take part in a protest against the government of Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orban outside the
parliament in central Budapest yesterday.
Hungarians rally against Orban
BUDAPEST:
Thousands
of
Hungarians took to the streets
of Budapest yesterday seeking
support from Chancellor Angela
Merkel against their Prime
Minister Viktor Orban a day
ahead of the German leader’s
visit to the ex-communist nation.
The roughly 4,000 protestors,
according to AFP estimates, gathered outside parliament to send a
message that they oppose Orban’s
right-wing policies and moves
closer to Moscow and away from
Brussels.
“I want Merkel to draw a line
and to warn Orban not to get too
cosy with Russia,” Maria Miklosi,
a 54-year-old chemist said, holding an EU ﬂag in support of
Hungary’s membership in the
28-nation bloc.
Smaller rallies were held simultaneously in 11 towns across
Hungary as well as six cities
around Europe, including London
and Amsterdam. During her brief
visit today, the ﬁrst since Orban
came to power in 2010, Merkel
will deliver a speech at Hungary’s
German language Andrassy
University and visit a synagogue.
Orban has supported EU
sanctions against Russia over its
involvement in Ukraine, but he
has also voiced unease about them
saying the EU had “shot itself in
the foot” by damaging trade relations with Moscow.
“Merkel will do everything to
not let Budapest diverge from
the common European line and
weaken the EU’s and Berlin’s
position in the Russian-Ukranian
conﬂict,” Daniel Hegedus, an analyst at the German Council on
Foreign Relations said.
AFP
BERLIN:
A
congress
of
Germany’s anti-euro AfD party
ending yesterday moved to
streamline its leadership structure in a bid to be more effective
after weeks of dispute within
the ﬂedgling group.
Bernd Lucke, founder of the
Alternative for Germany (AfD),
won broad backing on Saturday
from the around 1,700 party faithful gathered in the northwestern
city of Bremen for his proposal
that one leader head the party
instead of three, which he called
“amateurish”.
The former economics professor said the pared-down structure would help make things more
professional, telling delegates the
two-year-old party was “not a
skittles club or rabbit breeding
association, which one can lead
part-time”.
He also hailed the victory of
Greece’s hard-left Syriza party
and its new Prime Minister Alexis
Tsipras, to whom Lucke described
himself as being “very grateful for
having stood up to show everyone
in the EU that things simply can’t
continue as they are.”
The AfD leader also voiced
support for the renegotiation—or
complete forgiveness—of Greece’s
massive debt, saying “there was
no other solution” that will allow
the country escape its crushing
indebtedness.
Lucke, the AfD’s highest proﬁle ﬁgure, faces criticism within
the party for allegedly trying to
extend his power through the
structural reform, which will
Following the collapse of
Saturday’s talks, there was no
word on when renewed negotiations might take place.
REUTERS
Russia sends
British satellite
into orbit
MOSCOW: Russia yesterday
carried out its ﬁrst space launch
of the year, using its commercial
Proton rocket to send a British
satellite into orbit.
The launch went ahead as
planned just after 1230GMT from
the Russia-owned Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, a live
broadcast shown by Russia’s
Roscosmos space agency showed.
It is expected to reach orbit at
0402GMT today.
The communications satellite
Inmarsat-5 F2 is the second in a
$1.6bn ﬂeet called Global Xpress
designed to provide broadband
communications on land, at sea
and in the air.
The I-F F2 satellite will cover
the Americas and the Atlantic
Ocean, according to Inmarsat.
The Proton-M rocket has
launched numerous Western and
Asian commercial satellites, but
it has suffered several setbacks
in recent years.
In 2013, a rocket carrying
cargo for the International Space
Station exploded in mid-air right
after takeoff.
A year earlier, a smooth launch
ended in failure after the rocket
missed the correct orbit, losing
two satellites in the process.
involve a tandem of two leaders
dropping to a single party chief
in December.
The AfD’s main battle cry when
it was founded in early 2013 in the
wake of ﬁnancial turbulence that
almost brought the eurozone to
its knees was for an orderly dissolution of the euro.
It narrowly missed entering the
German parliament in 2013 general election.
But it made a breakthrough
last year by winning seats in the
European Parliament, followed by
three German state assemblies
after the party sought to widen
its appeal by incorporating populist issues such as law and order,
immigration and traditional social
values.
It now hopes to enter
Hamburg’s city-state assembly
in a February 15 vote.
The party, which invited
experts to the Bremen conference
to speak on tax, social and health
issues, plans to ﬁnalise its programme of policies in November.
But Lucke made clear he
wanted to position the party,
which analysts say is made up
of three factions — neo-liberal,
national conservative and a hardright populist wing — in the political centre.
He also supported the call by
Greece’s new anti-austerity government for a debt write-down,
saying on Sunday that there
was “no way around it” but that
Athens must quit the eurozone in
return.
MONROVIA: Liberia’s education ministry said yesterday it
had postponed by two weeks
the reopening of the country’s
schools, which were closed six
months ago to limit the spread
of the Ebola virus.
Classes had been set to resume
on Monday, but the ministry said
in a statement parents and students needed more time to prepare for the new school year.
“Classes will start on Monday,
February 16, 2015,” the statement
said.
Liberia is one of three west
African countries hit by the deadliest Ebola outbreak on record,
together with Guinea and Sierra
Leone. Schools in all three countries were closed last year over
the outbreak, which has killed
around 9,000 people.
The rate of new infections has
slowed signiﬁcantly in recent
weeks, paving the way for a gradual return to normal.
In Guinea, children returned
to school on January 19. Sierra
Leone has said it will restart
classes in March.
Liberia’s
President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf
this week cited cost as a factor
hampering the resumption of
classes in her country.
AFP
AGENCIES
Ebola-hit Liberia
delays school
reopening
MONDAY 2 FEBRUARY 2015
www.thepeninsulaqatar.com
INTERNATIONAL
11
Lawmakers for
tightening of
US visa rules
Visa-free travel plan under scrutiny
WASHINGTON: US politicians are calling for changes
to a law that allows Europeans
and other foreigners to enter
the country without visas, citing
fears that jihadists could exploit
the rules to stage attacks on
American soil.
The visa waiver programme,
which covers tourists from
38 countries, represents the
“Achilles’ heel of America”, said
Senator Dianne Feinstein, who is
urging a tightening of the rules.
The attacks against the French
satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo
in Paris this month have renewed
concerns in Washington that
extremists with Western passports will slip into the United
States under the cover of the
visa-free travel programme.
Feinstein, former head of the
Senate Intelligence Committee,
is working on a bill to reform the
rules that will be proposed soon,
her aides said. Other lawmakers
also are eyeing changes to the
law, including Candice Miller, a
Republican from Michigan, who
introduced a bill that would enable the Department of Homeland
Security (DHS) to suspend countries from the programme if they
fail to provide key information on
potential suspects.
The Paris attacks, carried out by
men with French passports, and
the growing number of Europeans
volunteering to ﬁght with jihadists
in Syria and Iraq — an estimated
3,000 to 5,000 — offers a chilling
reminder for Americans of dangerous terror plots.
Zacarias Moussaoui, known
as the “20th hijacker” in the
September 11, 2001 attacks, travelled to the United States simply
by presenting his French passport. And Richard Reid, who tried
to blow up a US-bound airliner in
December 2001 with an explosive
hidden in his shoe, needed no visa
with his British passport.
However, the US government
has dramatically revised procedures for the visa-free travel programme since the 9/11 attacks.
Starting in 2008, passengers
planning to travel under the visa
waiver rules have to ﬁll out a special form beforehand, known as
the Electronic System for Travel
Authorisation (ESTA).
The electronic forms are an
important tool, allowing US
authorities to see well in advance
who is trying to enter the United
States, said Christian Beckner,
deputy director at the Centre for
Cyber and Homeland Security at
George Washington University.
Homeland Security Secretary
Jeh Johnson on Thursday warned
it would be “a mistake” to scrap
the visa waiver programme, but
he acknowledged that security for
the program could be “improved”.
Some US lawmakers have
complained that countries that
take part in the programme are
not fulﬁlling their obligation to
share information on potential
extremists.
In 2012, 19.1 million people
entered the United States under
the visa waiver rules, representing about 40 percent of all temporary visitors to the country.
Most of the 38 nations in the programme are European, as well as
longtime US allies such as Japan,
South Korea and Australia. Chile
is the most recent country to join.
According to US border
authorities, 4,300 requests to
travel under the programme
were refused since 2008 because
the applicants appeared on lists
of terror suspects. During the
same period, 22,500 requests were
rejected because the applicant
used a stolen passport.
AFP
People walk past Finsbury Park Mosque during an open day in London yesterday.
London mosque shakes off bad reputation
LONDON: Could anything be
more “British” than meeting
the neighbours over a cup of tea
and some biscuits?
That is what greeted curious visitors yesterday who came
through the doors of London’s
Finsbury Park Mosque, which
has long sought to shake off a
reputation as a centre of radical
Islamism.
“Come in, come in, you are
all welcome,” retired doctor
Mohammed Ali Said told visitors
to the mosque, whose former
imam Abu Hamza was jailed for
life in New York on terrorism
charges last month. “We don’t
have any bombs,” he joked.
The kind-eyed Said was one of a
group of volunteers who organised
an open day at the mosque, part of
a Muslim Council of Britain initiative to promote better understanding of Islam following the
Blizzard-like conditions in Chicago
Labour and Lib Dems to hit joint
total of 339 seats, study predicts
shows Labour on 291 seats, the
Conservatives 281, the Lib Dems
48 and others 30. The model produces a result that is more optimistic than many others about
the performance of the Lib Dems
— a losing fewer than 10 seats and
sharply at odds with claims that
the party could crash to as few
as 25 seats.
This would give a LabourLib Dem coalition a total of 339
seats and a majority of 14. A
Conservative-Lib Dem coalition
would also be possible, but with a
tiny majority since the two parties
would only muster 329 seats.
The Essex forecasting model
works by combining the number
of seats won by parties in the previous election with voting intentions data from polls conducted
six months prior to the election.
“Ten years ago it was different.
Since then we’ve worked tirelessly
to open our centre, our mosque,
our activities to the public,” said
Khalid Oumar, one of the mosque
trustees. Despite the change in
leadership and new focus on
community relations, Finsbury
Park mosque received a string of
threatening emails and letters in
the wake of the Paris attacks.
As the day wore on, and visitors kept arriving, the mosque
was ﬁlled with the sound of
laughing children and theological discussion. Annalou Oakland,
an 67-year-old artist, said relations with the community had
improved. “There was big fear
around this particular mosque
in the past and it’s really good to
hear what they’re doing and to
meet people one-on-one,” Oakland
said. “We have more in common
than differences.”
It was one of 20 mosques in
Britain taking part in the initiative
to promote better understanding
of the Muslim community, which
makes up ﬁve percent of the
population in England and Wales
according to the 2011 census.
French teacher and mosque
volunteer Nabil Alex Robbins,
34, who grew up in a Protestant
Christian family and converted
to Islam, said the event had been
“extremely positive”.
“There is a big problem in the
West that people, through no fault
of their own, do not know that
much about Islam,” Robbins said.
“We’re here to show people that
we are a peaceful mainstream
mosque that does not promote
extremism in any form and that
we are here to promote harmonious relationships between the
Muslim community and the wider
community.”
AFP
Toddler shoots parents with
one bullet after ﬁnding gun
A worker pushes a snow plough to clear a path during blizzard-like conditions in Chicago, Illinois, yesterday.
LONDON: The Labour Party will
narrowly win more seats than the
Conservatives — and the Liberal
Democrats will be saved from wipe
out by the ﬁrst-past-the-post system, according to a new electoral
forecast by Prof Paul Whiteley at
the University of Essex, co-director of the British Election Study
from 2001 to 2012.
Whiteley’s forecast, based on
mathematical modelling, focuses
on what happened to seats in
previous election rather than
the overall share of the vote
and is based on a model developed while the British Election
Study was based at Essex. This
model successfully predicted the
outcomes of the 2005 and 2010
general elections.
The new forecast for the 2015
election released to the Guardian
recent terror attacks in Paris.
As well as cups of tea, visitors
were offered English translations
of the Holy Quran and the opportunity to read about the Muslim
religion and its history on information boards.
After 20 people had arrived,
the doctor asked them to remove
their shoes and took them to the
prayer room to explain the ﬁve
pillars of Islam: The profession of
faith, prayer, giving alms, fasting
during Ramadan and making a
pilgrimage to Makkah.
“Yes, there is a bad history of
this mosque but we changed that,”
Said told the diverse audience,
which included Britons of all ages,
a young Spanish couple, and a student doing a doctorate on Islam.
“Islam means peace and our
greeting when we meet someone
is ‘peace be upon you’. It is the
religion of peace,” he added.
Whiteley said that the model’s
track record was good: in 2005, the
average prediction error for the
Conservatives, Labour and Liberal
Democrats was 11 seats, and on
that occasion the model predicted
that Labour would get 358 seats
when they actually won 356.
It was slightly less accurate in
2010 with an average error of 18
seats for the three major parties,
predicting that the Conservatives
would get 293 seats, for example,
when they actually won 307.
Whitely acknowledged that the
model forecast a relatively large
number of Lib Dem seats, but that
appeared to be because there is a
stronger incumbent effect for Lib
Dem MPs than any other parties,
partly due to many of their MPs
long holding marginal seats.
THE GUARDIAN
MEXICO:
A
toddler
in
Albuquerque, New Mexico, shot
both his parents with just one
bullet on Saturday, after apparently reaching in to his mother’s
handbag to get her iPad and coming across a loaded gun instead.
The 3-year-old and his 2-yearold sister were taken into the care
of local authorities. Both adults
survived the shooting, although
the mother remained in the hospital yesterday for close monitoring because she is eight months
pregnant.
The single bullet pierced the
father’s buttock and hip and then
hit the mother in the shoulder.
Police arrived to a chaotic scene
at the motel where the family
was staying. A police spokesman for the Albuquerque Police
Department criticised the parents
for keeping a gun unsecured in
the vicinity of two children.
“I can’t tell you why they had
a loaded gun next to small children. Where are their priorities?
It was lucky nobody got killed,”
said ofﬁcer Simon Drobik.
The couple, who are in their
twenties, face charges of criminal
neglect of the children. Drobik said
there were also two “huge” pit bull
dogs in the cramped motel room
with the family when he arrived, as
the ﬁrst ofﬁcer on the scene.
Police were not naming the
couple, prior to any charges
being brought. However, after
being released from hospital the
father spoke to a local television
station, KOB-TV, which named
him as Justin Reynolds and his
girlfriend as Monique Villescas.
All of a sudden we heard a gun
go off and the next thing I realised
she was bleeding. And when I sat
down on the bed I realised I had
been shot too,” Reynolds said.
He said the 2-year-old daughter had been sitting next to the
mother when the incident happened, and their son had shot
them from behind. “I called 911
then I grabbed towels to try to
stop her bleeding. I was worried
because I didn’t know if my son
had shot himself. He was shocked,
he was crying, it was all traumatising,” Reynolds said.
Drobik said that when he
arrived at the motel, the father
had called the children’s grandmother and she was trying to
comfort the children. The ofﬁcer
moved them to a room next door,
then went back to attend to the
wounded parents.
“It was a pretty gory scene. She
was bleeding a lot,” Drobik said.
Ofﬁcer Drobik put a tourniquet
on the mother’s arm and “she
screamed the place down”, he said.
A grand jury will consider charges
after detectives now working the
case take up the matter with the
district attorney’s ofﬁce.
According to Drobik, the father
could face federal charges because
he is a convicted felon on probation, which means he is prohibited
“from being around a gun or anyone with a gun”.
His girlfriend had apparently
bought the 9mm handgun from
a pawn shop in Saturday, hours
before the shooting. Drobik said
the couple reported that the toddler found the gun in his mother’s
handbag, but this account had
not been veriﬁed and there were
no independent witnesses. Police
were waiting to question the young
son gently in a special interview
room but were unsure what reliable information they would obtain
“as he’s only three”, Drobik said.
Earlier reports described the
toddler as having reached for an
iPod, but Drobik clariﬁed that
he understood it to have been an
iPad. The police took possession of
the gun after obtaining a warrant
to search the motel room. Neither
parent had been arrested, pending further investigations.
THE GUARDIAN
US top court weighs use of lethal injection drug
WASHINGTON: The US Supreme Court is due
to review the use of lethal injection drugs following several bungled executions that saw inmates
gasping for air during prolonged killings.
The court will revisit the 2008 “Baze vs. Daze”
ruling that deemed lethal injection does not violate
the Eighth Amendment to the US Constitution,
which prohibits “cruel and unusual punishment.”
The court could ban the use of the controversial
midazolam sedative, which was used in three
botched executions in the United States last year
and is not approved by the US Food and Drug
Administration to be used as an anesthetic.
The case was brought by four Oklahoma inmates
scheduled to be killed on death row, but one was
killed before this week’s decision to stay all executions using the disputed drug in the state.
AFP
12
MONDAY 2 FEBRUARY 2015
www.thepeninsulaqatar.com
ASIA / PHILIPPINES
Thousands take
to HK streets
for democracy
True universal suffrage sought
HONG KONG: Thousands of
pro-democracy protesters took
to the streets of Hong Kong yesterday for the ﬁrst time since
mass demonstrations shut down
parts of the city for more than
two months.
A sea of yellow umbrellas — the
symbol of the campaign — moved
slowly through central Hong
Kong with crowds shouting for
“true universal suffrage”.
But numbers were well below
expectations with 13,000 attending according to organisers — just
over a quarter of the 50,000 they
had hoped for.
“Today’s protest wasn’t a small
one. It was smaller than we
expected, but it’s wrong to say
Hong Kongers have given in to
fake democracy,” said organiser
Daisy Chan.
Police said up to 8,800 people
had joined the march, a fraction of
the tens of thousands who gathered at the peak of the protests.
Authorities have made no concessions to activists’ demands and
tensions remain high in the semiautonomous Chinese territory.
Police warned ahead of the rally
that demonstrators were likely to
once again try to occupy some of
Hong Kong’s main roads, which
were cleared of tented camps in
December.
But by late afternoon the
march remained peaceful, with
no sign that the crowds — including many people carrying yellow
balloons — planned to take back
the streets.
“We don’t have a plan (to reoccupy). If others want to do it, they
will have to do it themselves,” student leader Alex Chow said.
Despite the disappointing turnout, there was a sense of determination among demonstrators.
“We just want to express our
frustration with the government in Hong Kong,” said protester Ronnie Chan, who is in
his 40s and works in sales and
marketing.
“We understand there is very
little we can do, but if we don’t
speak out nothing will change.”
The pro-democracy rallies
drew around 100,000 at their
height and saw intermittent violent clashes with police, but public support faded as the weeks
dragged by.
China has promised Hong
Kongers the right for the ﬁrst
time to vote for their next chief
executive in 2017. But it ruled that
nominees must be vetted by a
pro-Beijing committee, a proposal
which has been heavily criticised
by activists.
The founders of the prodemocracy movement including
Benny Tai, along with teenage
activist Joshua Wong and other
student leaders, urged residents
Protesters from Hong Kong’s Umbrella Movement march through the streets calling for genuine universal suffrage yesterday.
to keep ﬁghting as they joined
Sunday’s rally. “If we don’t dream,
we don’t have hope. We should
persist then we will succeed,” said
Tai.
Wong warned against accepting universal suffrage within
the restrictions of Beijing’s
framework.
“I hope people understand that
if we take that now, it will be forever,” he said.
But political analyst Sonny Lo
said residents were exhausted
from protests over political
reform. “At this moment, members of the public are tired of
politics. The democrats have to
strategise very carefully,” said Lo,
head of the social sciences department at the Hong Kong Institute
of Education.
Hong Kong’s government is
urging the public to support
Beijing’s electoral plan, which
needs the backing of two-thirds of
the city’s legislature to be passed.
Lam Woon-kwong, convenor of
the Executive Council or cabinet,
warned campaigners to accept
Beijing’s offer.
“You can’t threaten the central
authorities,” he told a radio programme yesterday.
“If we can have consensus to
have universal suffrage in 2017
ﬁrst and democratise further
later, it would be a more pragmatic approach.”
Philippine minister says not informed in advance of raid
MANILA: The Philippine interior minister said yesterday he
did not know in advance of plans
for an anti-terror raid that triggered a bloodbath in which 44
police commandos were killed.
Manuel Roxas, who is in charge
of the national police, said he had
no foreknowledge of the January
25 operation.
The huge losses shocked and
enraged the nation and imperilled a peace pact with the main
Muslim rebel group in the southern island of Mindanao.
“They did not tell me about
this... I’m not saying I would have
known better but I also can’t help
feeling I was not given a chance
to ensure there was better coordination,” he told demoralised
members of the police Special
Action Force (SAF) at their
headquarters.
The SAF commandos were
gunned down while on a mission to capture or kill Malaysian
bombmaker Zulkiﬂi bin Hir, alias
Marwan, a leading member of the
Jemaah Islamiyah group which
staged the 2002 Bali bombings in
Indonesia.
While authorities say Marwan
was killed, the commandos were
later ambushed by Muslim armed
groups — including ﬁghters of the
Moro Islamic Liberation Front
(MILF) which signed a peace
agreement with the government
last March.
The MILF said the raid should
have been coordinated with them
under the terms of the ceaseﬁre.
“Your job is tough and dangerous. It is the duty of the state to
give you the full support, equipment and training and not to send
you into hopeless operations,” an
apologetic Roxas said in a dialogue at SAF headquarters.
However the minister, a close
conﬁdante of President Benigno
Aquino, told the commandos to
await the result of an investigation
before jumping to conclusions.
Aquino had previously said he
was informed by top police of the
operation.
“We again appeal to everyone to give peace a chance,” his
spokesman Herminio Coloma said
in a radio address. “Let us unite
under this principle while seeking justice and accountability over
what happened... last week.”
Coloma said a ﬁnal peace
agreement would require the
12,000-strong MILF to disarm
in exchange for control over an
autonomous region in Mindanao.
But public anger threatens to
derail efforts to pass legislation
needed to implement the peace
accord before Aquino steps down
in 2016.
The main gate of national police
headquarters in suburban Manila
has become an unofﬁcial memorial bedecked with ﬂowers, candles
and other tokens left by mourners. About 200 military veterans
and serving soldiers drove up on
motorcycles yesterday, offering
prayers and lighting candles.
AFP
Manila slum ﬁre
Lanka shuns Australian
after resort scrapped
Filipino ﬁremen hose the smouldering remains of a building during a ﬁre in a slum area of Pasay city, south
of Manila, yesterday. The ﬁre reportedly destroyed more than 200 houses made from light materials, leaving
around 400 families homeless.
COLOMBO: Sri Lanka’s new
government yesterday declared
Australian
billionaire
James
Packer unwelcome in the country
after the gaming mogul pulled
out of building a luxury resort
following a ban on new casinos.
Packer’s Crown Group on
Friday abandoned plans for the
$350m development, which would
have included a casino, after the
government also withdrew generous tax concessions granted under
the previous regime in efforts to
turn Colombo into a regional
gaming hub.
“Packer says he will not come.
Who asked you to come?” Prime
Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe
said in a statement released by
his ofﬁce. “Please don’t come —
not in this lifetime. “We need only
good investors... we don’t want an
economy relying on casinos,” he
said according to a transcript of
a speech released yesterday, a day
after it was delivered.
President Maithripala Sirisena
swept to power this month backed
by the country’s inﬂuential main
party of Buddhist monks, who had
strongly opposed plans to lure
gaming companies to Colombo.
On Thursday, the new government fulﬁlled his election pledges
to scrap the ﬁve percent tax rate
granted to Packer’s planned 450room resort and two other foreign-backed developments.
criticism. Internet, satellite television and mobile phone network at the ofﬁce, where Zia has
been holed up since she launched
a nationwide transport blockade
early January, remained severed.
“We got back power late
Saturday night. But other lines
including broadband Internet, fax,
cable televisions and mobile phone
remained snapped,” BNP spokesman Shamsuddin Dider said.
The power line was cut after a
government minister reportedly
threatened to sever the ofﬁce’s electrical supply and force Zia to starve
to death if she did not call off the
nationwide transport blockade.
Zia has been conﬁned to her
ofﬁce in Dhaka’s upmarket
Gulshan district since threatening to rally her supporters against
the government of bitter rival
Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina on
January 5, the ﬁrst anniversary of
a disputed general election.
Her conﬁnement has coincided
with the death of her youngest
son in Malaysia. Tens of thousands of mourners turned out
at his funeral on Tuesday in a
massive show of support for the
embattled former premier.
While holed up, Zia has
called a nationwide blockade
of roads, railways and waterways, triggering deadly unrest
that has left at least 42 people
dead and nearly 800 vehicles
AFP
Probe ordered
into Bangla
factory ﬁre
DHAKA: Bangladesh yesterday ordered an enquiry into a
plastics factory ﬁre which killed
13 workers, the latest in a series
of accidents that have highlighted appalling conditions in
the country’s workplaces.
A ﬁve-man government team
will investigate whether the
Nasim Plastics factory — housed
in a four-storey building in the
Dhaka suburb of Mirpur — had
a proper operating licence, ﬁre
equipment and statutory safety
features.
“The probe team will ﬁle a
report on their ﬁndings in three
days. We want to ﬁnd out what
caused this accident,” said Syed
Ahmed, head of the factory
inspection department.
Police and ﬁre ofﬁcers believe
Saturday’s blaze started when gas
cylinders exploded in the boiler
room, then raced through the
four-storey building in minutes.
The walls of the factory collapsed
due to the explosion.
Three workers are critically
ill in hospital with burns, police
said. The 13 who died were burnt
to death or suffocated after they
were trapped on the upper ﬂoors,
they said. More than a dozen
people suffered minor burns.
Australia gives
Philippines two
naval landing craft
ﬁrebombed or damaged.
She also called a 72-hour strike
from yesterday, despite nationwide high-school examinations in
which about 1.5 million students
are taking part.
Zia wants Hasina, her rival of
nearly three decades, to call fresh
polls after last year’s controversial polls, which opposition parties
boycotted on the grounds they
would be rigged.
MANILA: Australia is donating
two
decommissioned
military landing craft to the
Philippines after the archipelago
struggled with relief efforts following Super Typhoon Haiyan,
it was announced yesterday.
The vessels, which were decommissioned in November, will be
refurbished with modern safety
and navigation equipment before
being handed over.
“I expect the vessels will be
reﬁtted and ready for handover in May 2015,” Australian
Defence Minister Kevin Andrews
said in a statement released by
his country’s embassy. The two
44.5-metre-long craft, which are
designed to carry heavy supplies,
will be given to the Philippine
Navy to help with humanitarian
assistance and relief work.
AFP
AGENCIES
AFP
Power restored at Bangladesh opposition leader’s ofﬁce
DHAKA: Bangladesh restored
power to the ofﬁce of opposition leader Khaleda Zia, an ofﬁcial said yesterday, nearly a day
after it was cut in an apparent
bid to force her to call off crippling protests.
A spokesman for Zia’s
Bangladesh Nationalist Party
(BNP) said power was restored
some 20 hours after a technician
of the state-run power agency
cut the lines, sparking a hail of
But for some protesters, backing down is not an option.
“I’m just doing my bit. Some
people may have compromised,
but I deﬁnitely will not,” said one
father of two who gave his name
as Alvin.
Protests in Hong Kong predate the Occupy movement — last
July hundreds of thousands demonstrated a month before Beijing
ruled on political reform.
MONDAY 2 FEBRUARY 2015
www.thepeninsulaqatar.com
PAKISTAN / AFGHANISTAN
Rocket attack
kills two cops
in Pakistan
13
Local election
schedule to be
announced before
February 12
Volkswagen show
18 policemen lost lives in Karachi in Jan
QUETTA: A rocket attack targeting a senior police ofﬁcer
and his family killed two police
escorts in restive southwestern Pakistan, ofﬁcials said yesterday. The incident happened
late on Saturday when district
police chief Asghar Ali Yusufzai
was travelling with his family
from Khuzdar district to the
town of Gwadar in Baluchistan
province.
“The vehicle carrying Yusufzai
and his family came under rocket
attack as they passed Pasni town,”
Baluchistan home secretary
Akbar Durrani said.
He said the rocket hit the vehicle escorting Yusufzai, killing two
policemen and injuring another,
while the senior ofﬁcer and his
family escaped unhurt.
A senior administration ofﬁcial
in Gwadar, Hameed Abro, conﬁrmed the incident and casualties.
Nobody has claimed responsibility but the area is one of the
most restive parts of the province. Separatists have regularly
attacked police and troops along
with state infrastructure.
Baluchistan, Pakistan’s largest but least developed and most
sparsely populated province bordering Iran and Afghanistan,
has been racked for decades by
a separatist insurgency that was
revived in 2004.
The separatists believe locals
do not receive a fair share of the
province’s energy and mineral
wealth. Rights groups accuse
the government of extra-judicial
detentions and killing of activists.
Meanwhile, ofﬁcials yesterday
said that over 108 people were
killed in separate incidents of
target killings based on political,
personal and religious enmities in
the southern port city of Karachi
in January.
Karachi police issued a report
saying that 18 policemen, two
paramilitary troops and ﬁver doctors were also among the people
who became a target of unidentiﬁed gunmen in the city since the
beginning of New Year.
Several people associated with
seminaries and religious groups
also became victims of the bullets
which were ﬁred on the basis of
religious differences.
The police report came a day
after Prime Minister Nawaz
Sharif chaired a high level meeting in the city to review its law
and order situation.
The Prime Minister ordered
probe into the killings and sought
report from police chief and
director general of Paramilitary
troops’ stationed in Sindh province with Karachi as capital city.
In an earlier report last month,
Karachi Police said that more
than 40 groups of banned militants group Tehrik-e-Taliban
Pakistan (TTP) are active in the
city who are allegedly involved in
extortion, target killings, kidnapping for ransom and other terrorist activities in the city.
AGENCIES
A Volkswagen Microbus on display during the third annual Volkswagen Car Show in Karachi yesterday. The
show, organised by the Volkswagen Club Of Pakistan and Motorhead Pakistan, saw some 120 vintage automobiles participating in the event.
ISLAMABAD: The Election
Commission of Pakistan (ECP)
will submit a tentative schedule for by-elections in Khyber
Pakhtunkhwa (K-P), Punjab
and Sindh before the Supreme
Court on February 12, as the
apex court is set to take up the
issue again.
Sources in the ECP said that
the commission is working on
tentative dates for the local government (LG) polls in these provinces and will submit options to
the Supreme Court in order to
build pressure on the provinces
and get them to fulﬁll their constitutional obligation.
Unlike Balochistan — which
wound up its elections late this
month- the other three provinces
haven’t been able to conduct polls
since 2009 when the last LG system expired.
INTERNEWS
PM forms panel to ﬁnalise Senate candidates
ISLAMABAD: Prime Minister Nawaz
Sharif constituted yesterday a 14-member
parliamentary board of the ruling Pakistan
Muslim League-N to ﬁnalise party tickets
to be offered to candidates for contesting
the upcoming Senate elections.
According to an ofﬁcial announcement,
which was made from the Prime Minister’s
Ofﬁce instead of the party’s central secretariat, Sharif himself is the chairman of the
board whereas Finance Minister Ishaq Dar
is its convener.
The board comprises Punjab Chief Minister
Shahbaz Sharif, PML-N chairman Raja
Zafarul Haq, secretary general Iqbal Zafar
Jhagra, Information Minister Pervaiz Rashid,
Railways Minister Khawaja Saad Raﬁque,
Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Governor Sardar
Mehtab Ahmed Khan, Pir Sabir Shah, Ismail
Rahu, Sardar Sanaullah Zehri, Sardar Yaqoob
Khan Nasir, Dr Asif Kirmani and Nuzhat Sadiq.
Raja Zafarul Haq, Pervaiz Rashid and Sardar
Yaqoob Nasir are among those eight PML-N
senators, out of 16, who will stand retired on
March 11 after the expiry of their six-year term
in the upper house of parliament.
The three senators, sources said, were
among those aspiring for the party’s tickets
to contest the elections. Out of the party’s
eight retiring senators, seven are from Punjab
and one from Balochistan. The party had
invited applications from aspiring candidates
last week and Jan 30 was the last date for
submission of application forms with a nonrefundable fee of Rs50, 000.
A source in the party said that so far the
PML-N’s central secretariat had received
more than 140 applications. He said though
Jan 30 was the deadline, the party would
continue to receive applications till the
parliamentary board held its ﬁrst meeting.
Observers believe that with only a few seats
available against a large number of aspirants,
the PML-N leadership will have to take tough
decisions while ﬁnalising candidates for the
upcoming elections.
A number of party members, including
old workers as well as the newcomers, have
already started lobbying within the party.
Since Senate elections depend on the party
position in four provincial assemblies and the
National Assembly, the PML-N is expected to
gain almost all the 11 seats from Punjab and
two seats from Islamabad whereas the party
may get only two to three seats from Khyber
Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan.
Polling to elect new senators will be
held on March 3, according to the Election
Commission of Pakistan.
INTERNEWS
Govt criticised for allowing coal imports
LAHORE: Pakistani government’s permission to coal import for power
generation invited anger from industry stakeholders, who dub this move
as negligence to Thar resources.
Industry sources yesterday criticised the government for dropping projects,
which proposed cheap power production on fast track basis on local coal and
including power plants on imported coal, which were relatively at early stage
of planning, in the early harvest programme — part of free trade agreement
between Pakistan and China. Ahsan Iqbal, federal Minister for Planning,
Development and Reforms, said the notion of not giving importance to indigenous resources is not true.
INTERNEWS
An Afghan girl ﬁlls water cans on the outskirts of Mazar-e-Sharif yesterday. Water in Afghanistan remains an issue especially between neighbours
Pakistan and Iran.
Pakistan plans refugee camps for Afghans
ISLAMABAD: The government of
Pakistan has directed provinces to
acquire land at suitable locations near
the Afghan border for establishing new
camps for refugees to facilitate their
repatriation after December 2015.
“New camps are to be established near
borders at suitable places so that the repatriation could be facilitated after December
2015,” said the Ministry of States and
Frontier Regions in a letter issued to the
chief secretaries of the four provinces and
respective Afghan commission rates a few
days ago.
The ministry issued these directives to
the provinces following a high-level meeting,
which took place at the Prime Minister’s
House in Islamabad on January 16.
The Safron ministry, which oversees matters associated with Afghan nationals living
in the country, has also asked the provincial
government to make efforts to restrict the
movement of refugees to their designated
camps.
Earlier, a meeting held at the Safron
ministry on January 6 had discussed a proposal to conduct temporary registration of
undocumented Afghan nationals through
the National Database Registration
Authority across the country.
The government has renewed Proof of
Registration (PoR) cards of 1.6 million
Afghan refugees and validated their stay in
Pakistan until December 2015.
Majority of these refugees live in
Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.
The government has repeatedly said the
stay of registered refugees in the country
will not extended beyond 2015.
Sources in the provincial secretariat
said establishing new camps along the border was not feasible and that instead of
establishing new camps, the government
should send refugees to their country after
December 2015.
“This is an unwise move, which is also
unfeasible ﬁnancially as well as administratively,” said a senior ofﬁcial concerned.
The ofﬁcial said refugee camps were
closed down in Fata in 2005 for security
reasons and that now they (Afghans) were
sent back again to the tribal areas, which
lacked stability due to militancy.
Ofﬁcials said the relocation of 1.6 million
registered Afghans to new camps would cost
around Rs20bn.
They suggested that instead of spending
billions of rupees on putting up new camps
and providing allied facilities there, the government should invest the money in the
repatriation of refugees.
“The establishment of new camps require
thousands of kanal of lands,” he said.
The Safron ministry’s letter said the
provincial governments should come up
with an action plan for acquiring land for
new refugee camps and submit ﬁnancial proposals for the shifting to designated camps
of Afghan refugees living in urban areas.
The terrorist attack on the Army Public
School and College Peshawar on December
16, which left 150 students and teachers
dead and over 100 injured, prompted the
federal government to plan the repatriation
of both registered and unregistered Afghan
refugees living in the country.
The police have already begun crackdown
on unregistered Afghans in urban areas in
Punjab, Islamabad, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa,
Sindh and Balochistan, while the movement
of registered refugees has been restricted.
The police have arrested a large number
of undocumented Afghans in Peshawar and
deported them to their country via Torkham
check post. The registered refugees have
restricted their movement in Peshawar and
other towns after the crackdown.
The relevant ofﬁcials said the Safron ministry had also asked provinces to immediately compile the data of registered Afghan
refugees about their business, hired houses,
transport and properties through the excise
departments.
Both registered and unregistered
Afghans have business across the country.
INTERNEWS
14
MONDAY 2 FEBRUARY 2015
www.thepeninsulaqatar.com
INDIA
February 7 vote will be a two-horse contest
NEW
DELHI:
After
a
49-day AAP government and
President’s rule for nearly a
year, Delhi will vote later this
week to elect a new administration whose control has virtually become a two-horse contest
between the BJP and the AAP.
The Congress, which governed
Delhi for 15 years and whose tally
tumbled from 43 seats to 8 in the
2013 assembly polls, has arguably
been out of the running for the 70
assembly seats since the beginning of the poll campaign. A total
of 673 candidates from various
political parties are in the fray
for the February 7 (Saturday)
polls. The results will be out on
February 10.
For a resurgent Bharatiya
Janata Party (BJP), which has
been on a winning streak in other
states’ assembly polls after it rode
to power in the centre in the 2014
Lok Sabha polls, it is a “battle of
prestige”. It has been out of power
since 1998 in the national capital.
For the Aam Aadmi Party
(AAP), which resigned following
a 49-day stint after it stunned
the entire country by toppling the
ruling Congress, winning Delhi is
a make or break of sorts. The poll
campaigning has already reached
its crescendo with the AAP and
the BJP pulling out all stops and
going hammer and tongs at each
other.
On the one hand, the BJP is
hard-selling Prime Minister
Narendra Modi’s model of development to gain power and on the
other, it is running a high-decibel
campaign to slam the AAP and its
chief, Arvind Kejriwal.
By issuing advertisements in
the print and electronic media,
which lampoon Kejriwal, the BJP
has made it quite evident that it
sees the AAP as its only roadblock
in claiming the Delhi throne.
So much so that it roped in
Kejriwal’s friend-turned-foe and
former police ofﬁcer Kiran Bedi
and declared her as its chief
ministerial candidate. The move
was in contradiction to its earler
stand of contesting under a collective leadership.
Since women’s security has also
become a major poll issue, the
step was also seen as crucial to
wooing women voters. There are
13.3 million voters, of whom 5.9
million are women. “We can’t take
them (AAP) for granted like we
did in the last polls,” said a senior
BJP leader. He, however, said “the
party will romp home as Kejriwal
has been exposed”.
How serious a threat is the
AAP to the BJP is clear from the
fact the BJP-led central cabinet
ministers and other stalwarts like
Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister
Shivraj Singh Chouhan had to be
brought in to campaign.
Modi has already held three
poll rallies in the capital and is
expected to address two more.
Besides, tackling a powerful and
resourceful BJP, the AAP’s other
challenge is to convince voters
that it won’t quit again.
In all the public meetings across
the capital, which will total up to
120 by February 5, as an AAP
source said, Kejriwal never forgets to make one particular point:
“Is bar istifa nahin denge.”(Won’t
resign this time)”.
Kejriwal quit as Delhi chief
minister last February 14 after
failing to pass the anti-graft
Jan Lokpal bill in the assembly.
President’s rule was imposed on
February 17. In the 2013 polls, the
BJP had bagged 31 seats and the
AAP 28.
“The people were upset with
us only because we quit the government. But we are driving
our point home in every public
meeting we hold that we were
forced to resign,” AAP leader
Manish Sisodia said.
In an interview to IANS,
Kejriwal had admitted that middle class had become disillusioned with the party, but was
now returning to the AAP’s fold.
It would be an uphill task for
the Congress to regain ground.
It seems more to be a battle for
survival. The party is banking
on former union minister Ajay
Maken, who has been appointed
as its campaign chief.
Delhi Congress unit chief and
former minister Arvinder Singh
Lovely not contesting reﬂects the
low morale of the party. A threetime cabinet minister in Sheila
Dikshit’s cabinet, Lovely was one
of the eight MLAs who retained
their seats in 2013.
In its manifesto, the party
eulogizes its achievements during its 15-year rule and offers
what largely seems to be promises
already made by the AAP - cheap
power and water.
“We are reaching out to people
and telling that both the AAP and
the BJP are two sides of the same
coin. AAP made a mess of Delhi in
49 days and BJP failed to do anything for Delhi in the past seven
months,” Maken said.
So far, Congress chief Sonia
Gandhi and her son and party
vice president Rahul Gandhi
have addressed three rallies. The
party is trying to woo the voters
living in slums - a traditional vote
bank which shifted to the AAP
in the last poll. “We are aiming to get at least 12 seats,” said
a party insider. Sanjay Kumar,
a fellow at the Centre for the
Study of Developing Societies
said: “Congress retaining its seats
might throw another hung assembly in Delhi.”
IANS
Delhi campaign
hits crescendo
Kejriwal, Modi and Sonia hold rallies
NEW DELHI: Prime Minister
Narendra Modi, Congress chief
Sonia Gandhi and AAP leader
Arvind Kejriwal yesterday made
determined bids to woo the people
of Delhi for February 7 assembly
polls, launching sharp attacks on
their rivals while seeking to convey their commitment to politics
of development.
Raising the pitch on last Sunday
before voting, Modi, Kejriwal and
Gandhi addressed rallies in different parts of the national capital
and drew enthusiastic response
from their supporters.
Though the battle is largely
seen to be between the Bharatiya
Janata Party and the Aam Aadmi
Party, Congress sees itself as a
“dark horse”. In the 2013 election
to the 70-member assembly, AAP
won 28 seats and ﬁnished a close
second to the BJP which won 31
seats. Congress only got eight.
In his rally in West Delhi’s
Dwarka area, Modi focused his
attack mainly on AAP, and said the
national capital needs an administration which works in harmony
with his central government.
Gandhi, addressing a rally
near Badarpur in south Delhi,
slammed Modi as a pracharak
and AAP chief Arvind Kejriwal
as dharnebaaj, while Kejriwal, in
his rally at Shastri Nagar in north
Delhi, taunted Modi over promises of bring back black money
and accused BJP of failing to fulﬁl
its promises on women’s security.
Modi hit out at both the AAP
and Congress for making “false
promises” and in an attack on the
former, said Delhi does not need
a government “which launches
agitations day and night”.
He urged people not to give a
fractured mandate and ensure
full majority for his party, saying even a small activity in the
national capital has an impact.
Thanking Delhi’s people for
their support in the Lok Sabha
elections, he said: “I have to
return it by doing development.
I have to solve problems in every
part (of Delhi). Give me a chance
to serve you.”
Modi said Delhi needs a responsible, sensitive government and
running an administration was a
serious task. “You cannot do it by
running away,” he said, taking a
dig at Kejriwal who quit as chief
minister after 49 days.
Referring to petrol and diesel
prices coming down due to international factors since he assumed
ofﬁce, Modi said his rivals credit
it to good luck but if “common
man can save money due to (my)
good luck, why bring someone
who does not have good luck”.
Gandhi, who addressed her
ﬁrst election rally, said her party
would bring back the “atmosphere
of development” in Delhi, if voted
to power and accused BJP and
AAP of making false promises.
“While one party has a pracharak (referring Modi’s days
Snow in Kashmir
A woman walks as snow falls in Srinagar yesterday. Kashmir received
fresh snowfall, with the local meteorological department predicting
moderate rains and snow in the plains and moderate to heavy rains
and snow at higher altitudes during the next 24 hours.
in RSS), who only does ‘prachar
(promotion)’, the other has a
dharnebaaj (agitator),” she said,
adding that the country does not
run only on slogans.
Accusing the central government of being anti-farmer and
diluting the land acquisition law,
Gandhi also raised incidents of
communal violence in Trilokpuri
and vandalisation of a church
in Dilshad Garden, calling for
defeating forces which spread
“politics of hatred”.
She also questioned Modi government’s sincerity in ﬁghting corruption while slamming the AAP
for running away from its responsibilities by quitting government.
Kejriwal, in his rally, hit back at
Congress and BJP leaders and said
he sits in protest not for himself
but for causes concerning people.
He hit out the BJP for failing to
honour its commitment to bring
back black money and now giving
insurance of Rs.1 lakh under the
Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana.
“Before elections they said we
will bring Rs.15 lakh (into each
account) in 100 days. After elections, they are saying ﬁrst you
die, then you will get Rs.1 lakh,”
he said.
Kejriwal also attacked the BJP
over remarks of some of its leaders concerning women. “How
will they protect women? If it is
in their hands, they will bundle
women in a room and lock it from
outside,” he said.
IANS
FROM LEFT: Arvind Kejriwal, Narendra Modi and Sonia Gandhi
Worried BJP ropes in Harsh
Vardhan to boost Kiran Bedi
NEW DELHI: Troubled by
reports that the voters of
Krishna Nagar, the constituency of BJP chief ministerial
candidate Kiran Bedi, are not
warming up to her, the senior
leadership has directed local
heavyweight and union minister Harsh Vardhan to “put in
extra efforts” to ensure that
Bedi wins here by a comfortable
margin, party sources said.
Considered to be a “traditional
seat” of the Bharatiya Janata
Party (BJP), Harsh Vardhan —
the party’s chief ministerial candidate in the 2013 assembly polls
and now a union minister in the
Narendra Modi government —
held the Krishna Nagar seat since
1993 before winning the Chandni
Chowk seat in the April-May 2014
general elections.
Sources said party workers
of the east Delhi locality, home
to mostly middle-class families,
are “demoralised” with Harsh
Vardhan being replaced by Bedi,
who is being seen as an outsider.
“The response to her road
shows and public meetings in
Krishna Nagar has been lukewarm. We were expecting better,”
a party leader, said.
“The party has realised that
the face of the campaigning has
to be Harsh Vardhan whosoever is
the candidate. He has been asked
to put in extra efforts to ensure
her victory,” the leader added.
Reports of a rift between Harsh
Vardhan and Bedi have also been
doing the rounds for some time
now. After joining the party Jan
15, Bedi had called all the seven
Delhi MPs to her residence for tea
Jan 20. As Harsh Vardhan arrived
late, Bedi left without meeting
him, reportedly leaving the minister for science and technology
and earth sciences fuming, the
sources said.
Harsh Vardhan however
accompanied Bedi on her ﬁrst
road show in Krishna Nagar Jan
21, when she ﬁled her nomination
papers, and at subsequent public meetings. Again, earlier this
week, Harsh Vardhan was absent
from a rally Bedi addressed in
Krishna Nagar, apparently peeved
by Bedi’s remark at a few days
earlier: “Doctor sahib (Harsh
Vardhan) has been taking care
of Krishna Nagar, now I will also
be your doctor.”
The rising differences between
the two have left the top leadership worried and with less than
a week to go for the polls, the
party is desperate to ensure that
they reconcile. Seciﬁc instructions have been given to Harsh
Vardhan to be present at all of
Bedi’s public meetings and rallies
as well as intensify the door-todoor campaign.
Meanwhile, the BJP has ofﬁcially denied that Bedi is facing
any challenges. “She is not facing
any problems in Krishna Nagar.
She is getting the love and support from all the people and will
win the seat easily,” BJP state
unit spokesperson BJP Ashwini
Upadhyay said.
IANS
Saradha scam: Arrested ex-union
minister sent to judicial custody
BSF foils 11 bids
by terrorists
to enter country
KOLKATA:
Former
union
minister Matang Sinh, arrested
by the CBI for his alleged complicity in the multi-crore-rupee
Saradha chit fund scam, could
not be presented in court yesterday as he was admitted to a
hospital. He was later sent to
judicial custody till February 13.
The court of acting Additional
Chief Judicial Magistrate S.
Chakraborty ordered Sinh —
who was admitted to the staterun SSKM Hospital — to be sent
to judicial custody till February
13 after the prosecution presented documents regarding his
custody.
The former minister of state for
parliamentary affairs in the P V
Narasimha Rao-led Congress government (1991-96) was arrested
Saturday on charges of criminal
conspiracy, cheating and misappropriation of funds. He was
subsequently hospitalised after
he complained of illness.
The counsel for the Central
Bureau of Investigation informed
the court that Sinh would be presented once he was released from
hospital.
JAMMU: The Border Security
Force (BSF) foiled 11 attempts
by terrorists in January to
sneak into Jammu and Kashmir
from Pakistan, a senior BSF
ofﬁcial has said. “Eight of the
bids were made in the last 15
days,” the ofﬁcial said here.
“The (terrorist) groups mostly
consisted of six to eight heavily armed militants belonging to
the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT),” he
added. According to the ofﬁcial,
the inﬁltration attempts were
made even as Pakistani border
guards shelled Arnia and R S
Pura sectors.
The ofﬁcial said intelligence
agencies believed that such
attempts were likely to be made in
the next few days as well. “We are
fully prepared to give them (militants) a hot reception,” he said.
The ofﬁcial said there were 21
violations of the 2003 ceaseﬁre
by the Pakistan Rangers in the
three districts of Jammu, Samba
and Kathua during January.
Indiscriminate ﬁring and mortar shelling by the Rangers last
month killed two BSF troopers
and a civilian.
IANS
“After his arrest, Matang Sinh
complained he was unwell. He
is now under treatment at the
SSKM Hospital. We have intimated the court that he is in
hospital and we will present him
in court once he is released from
the hospital,” the CBI counsel told
the media.
PLEA FOR REMAND
The counsel also pleaded before
the court that it should consider
the plea for remand once Sinh
was presented before it.
“We will seek either police or
judicial custody for him once he
is brought to the court from custody. We have also prayed before
the court that it should seek a
report about his health from the
SSKM hospital.”
The defence counsel urged
the court to grant bail to Sinh
as he was a liver transplant
patient and unwell due to related
complications.
Saradha Group chief and purported scam kingpin Sudipta
Sen, now behind bars, in a letter
to the CBI, had accused Sinh of
cheating him of Rs28 crore on the
promise of a 50 percent stake in a
media house owned by the former
Congress MP from Assam.
Sen had also accused Sinh’s
wife Manoranjana of duping him
of Rs25 crore in return for some
shares in a TV channel owned
by her.
The CBI earlier grilled
Manoranjana besides attaching
Sinh’s properties and raiding his
ofﬁces and residences.
The Enforcement Directorate,
which too is probing the scam,
had interrogated Sinh about his
alleged links with Sen and the
Saradha group. Sinh’s arrest
came a day after the CBI grilled
Trinamool Congress general
secretary and former railway
minister Mukul Roy.
Probing the multi-crore-rupee
scandal that came to light in
April 2013, the CBI has arrested
a host of inﬂuential people,
including Trinamool Rajya Sabha
member Srinjoy Bose, former
IPS ofﬁcer Rajat Majumdar,
West Bengal Transport Minister
Madan Mitra and Assamese
singer Sadananda Gogoi.
IANS
MONDAY 2 FEBRUARY 2015
www.thepeninsulaqatar.com
INDIA
Reviving Ganga: High on
promises, low on action
15
Rural Olympics
Entire plan over-ambitious, say environmentalists
VARANASI:
Nearly
nine
months after the Narendra
Modi government laid out an
elaborate plan to revive the
river Ganga here and clean up
the ancient city, there appears a
huge gap between his vision and
visible reality even as environmentalists dub the entire plan
as “over-ambitious”.
In the prime minister’s constituency, the local authorities have not
yet woken up to Modi’s vision for
the beautiﬁcation of the Ganga and
the ghats (the steps leading to the
river), which is why the problem
remains intractable, said students
from the Institute of Chartered
Accountants, who conducted a
clean-up drive in the area.
“The local authorities are not
responsive to the Swachh Bharat
call. There are very few bins.
Where do we throw the garbage
that we collect? There are no
garbage collection vans either in
the city,” said 21-year-old Shubh
Jindal, a participant in the Clean
India drive near the Assi Ghat
organised to generate awareness
about keeping Varanasi clean.
“There is a gap between what
Modiji said and what’s being done
on the ground. We are trying to
motivate others,” said another
student. While the locals remain
upbeat and pin hopes on Modi
for delivering his claims, experts
seem little impressed with the
moon that has been promised.
“It is a false plan developed by
the government... I am not satisﬁed with the pollution control
efforts so far because the government is ignoring the aviralta
(continuous ﬂow of water) aspect
of cleaning the Ganga,” Brahma
Dutt Tripathi, professor of environmental engineering at the
Benaras Hindu University, said.
While it is important to stress
on the problem of pollution, the
focus must go beyond as the
issue of the Ganga’s resurgence
is deeper than the contamination
caused by ﬂoral waste, dead bodies and industrial efﬂuents.
The issue of “nirmalta (clean
water) vs avirlata” is at the core,
said Tripathi, who is also a member of the National Ganges River
Basin Authority (NGRBA).
Functioning under the water
resources ministry, the NGRBA
is the ﬁnancing, planning, implementing, monitoring and coordinating authority for the Ganga.
“The Ganga is seriously suffering from the problem of reduced
ﬂow... due to construction of
dams on the main stream and
the Bhagirathi in Uattrakhand.
When water is stored in dams, it
leads to the problem of seepage,
affecting the quantity of water (in
the river),” Tripathi said.
The diversion of water for irrigation is another stress, he said. The
healthy ﬂow of water in the river
is key to ensuring its self-cleansing
potential, and “that’s the main reason why we are not able to control
pollution... Priority should be given
to enhancing the ﬂow of water and
ensuring its continuous ﬂow (aviralta). The clean water (nirmalta)
aspect depends on that,” the professor said. Another case in point is
the mismanagement of solid waste
by the local authorities. The ghats
being morphed into crematoriums only compounds the problem.
Floral waste, plastic bags, coconuts,
silt and other solid waste also dot
the ghats.
“About 33,000 dead bodies are
cremated on the Harish Chandra
and Manikarnika. Moreover, about
3,000 dead bodies of humans and
about 6,000 of animals are thrown
into the Ganga in Varanasi every
year,” said Tripathi, who has been
researching on the river since the
1970s. Equally concerned, the
Supreme Court asked the central
government last month to spell
out a time limit as no veriﬁable
progress was evident despite the
decades-old cleansing work.
The clarion call for reviving the
Ganga, seen as a winning card for
Modi from Varanasi, was at the
core of the BJP’s election manifesto
for the April-May 2014 general
elections. Under the public-privatepartnership model, the Modi government set aside Rs80,000 crore
for its plan for a “aviral aur nirmal
(continuous and clean)” Ganga.
Also, the time frame committed
to clean the 2,525km river stretch
from Gaumukh (Uttrakhand) to
Ganga Sagar (West Bengal) cannot
be accomplished within three years
as promised by the government in
its ﬁrst phase of the action plan,
say those who research the insidious factors responsible for a “dying
Ganga”.
IANS
Villagers race horse carts during the 79th Kila Raipur Rural Sports Festival, also known as the Rural Olympics,
at Kila Raipur, some 20km from Ludhiana, yesterday.
Kerala not to spare drug trafﬁckers
THIRUVANANTHAPURAM:
The Kerala government yesterday said national and international drug maﬁa rings are
looking at the state as a “fertile
ground” for their operations
and pledged not to spare anyone
involved in drug trafﬁcking.
The government’s reaction came
a day after Malayalam actor Shine
Tom Chacko and four women were
taken into custody in Kochi for
possessing cocaine valued at Rs1m
in international market.
“National and even international drug maﬁa are looking towards Kerala as a fertile
ground for their operations. We
are putting up a strong ﬁght
against such elements and we
will not spare anyone who is part
of this,” Home Minister Ramesh
Chennithala said. The maﬁa rings
are eyeing Kerala because of its
tourist potential, he added.
Chennithala said his ministry
was going ahead with conducting
massive awareness campaigns in
educational institutions.
“We have already launched a
massive campaign ‘Safe Campus
Clean Campus’ and it is a twopronged strategy which includes
awareness and police action. What
we saw yesterday (Saturday) was
police action and this will continue
very strongly. Law breakers will be
taken to task,” the minister said.
“Last week, we got together
60,000 students in Kollam district
as part of our awareness drive in our
ﬁght against all forms of substance
abuse. Similar programmes would be
held in all districts,” he said.
B Unnikrishnan, a director
and general secretary of the Film
Employees Federation of Kerala,
said that what happened with the
arrest of the actor should not be
taken to generalise issues.
IANS
Set up SIT to probe Sikh ‘genocide’ cases, Badal asks Modi
NEW DELHI: Punjab Chief Minister
Parkash Singh Badal yesterday sought
the personal intervention of Prime
Minister Narendra Modi in constituting a Special Investigation Team (SIT)
to probe all cases related to the 1984
anti-Sikh riots.
In a letter to Modi, Badal said the “genocide” of Sikhs was a “pre-planned” incident at the behest of Congress leaders.
Badal urged the central government
to take an immediate call on the recommendations of the Justice (retd) G P
Mathur panel, constituted by the Centre
in December last year, to re-investigate
several cases related to anti-Sikh violence that broke out in November 1984
after the assassination of then prime
minister Indira Gandhi.
The chief minister said the Shiromani
Akali Dal has been struggling to get justice for the victims of the 1984 riots in
Delhi and other parts of the country.
He said that on the Akali Dal’s demand,
the Justice Mathur panel was constituted in December 2014, by the central
government to examine the possibility of
setting up of an SIT for re-investigating
the 1984 ‘genocide’.
Badal said the panel had, in its 45-page
report, suggested setting up of an SIT.
Demanding re-investigation of many cases
where crucial evidence was overlooked and
cases were closed by Delhi Police even
without sending them to courts, Badal
said all such cases needed to be re-opened.
Accusing the previous Congress-led
government at the Centre and in Delhi
of pushing the anti-Sikh riots cases under
Mass marriage
Team ﬁles report
on discovery of
bodies found in
police morgue
Grooms put a vermillion mark on the foreheads of their brides during a mass marriage in Bhubaneswar
yesterday. Mass marriage ceremonies in India are organised by social groups to help those who cannot
afford the traditionally large marriage events.
Modi plans to visit China in May
BEIJING: India will make it
easier for Chinese companies
to do business in the country as it seeks to take bilateral economic ties with China
to “a qualitatively new level”,
External
Affairs
Minister
Sushma Swaraj said yesterday,
adding that Prime Minister
Narendra Modi will visit the
country in May.
Sushma Swaraj told the media
here that the prime minister
will visit China in May before
the BJP-led government completes one year in ofﬁce. The
minister held talks with her
Chinese counterpart Wang Yi
on a range of issues including
Modi’s upcoming visit.
Ministry spokesperson Syed
Akbaruddin said the two leaders
the carpet, Badal said the recommendations of the Mathur panel had given new
hope to victims of the riots. “By doing so,
the government of India will assuage the
bruised psyche of the Sikh community
and help them get justice,” Badal said.
Hundreds of Sikhs were targeted and
killed in Delhi and other places across
India by mobs in the aftermath of Indira
Gandhi’s assassination by her two Sikh
security personnel in October 1984. Many
Congress leaders were accused of instigating mobs to target Sikhs during the riots.
discussed how to make the prime
minister’s visit “an outcome oriented visit”. Sushma Swaraj said
her maiden visit to China was
focused on opening the additional route for the Kailash
Manasarovar Yatra.
In her address at the launch
of the second India-China
Media Forum, Sushma Swaraj
appreciated China’s decision
to open the additional route
through Nathula. She suggested
a six-point template including
“action-oriented approach” to
boost mutual ties.
The Modi government was
committed to exploring an early
settlement to the India-China
boundary row, she added.
Noting that China was India’s
largest partner in trade and
goods and the two economies are
moving to invest in each other,
she said: “Serious discussions
on enhancing connectivity have
been initiated. On that foundation, we are now seeking to take
our economic cooperation to a
qualitatively new level.”
“Another major thrust is in
establishing industrial parks
in two Indian states that would
contribute to the ‘Make in India’
initiative,” she said.
Sushma Swaraj said that as
both countries play a larger international role, “our contacts and
dialogues must commensurately
grow. As the two major civilisational powers of Asia, we should
have conﬁdence in each other, to
build on our shared interests”.
IANS
NEW DELHI: A forensic
team has submitted a report
on the gruesome discovery of
dozens of bones and decayed
body parts found in a police
morgue in northern India,
police said yesterday.
Police in Uttar Pradesh state
said the human remains, discovered on Friday, had apparently been left there after
autopsies and had been stored
in a post-mortem room that
had been locked since 2008.
“Sacks of bones and jars of
(decaying) organs were found
on Friday. The room had not
been used in over six years but
some workers spotted them
through an open window,”
senior police ofﬁcial G N Soni
said from Unnao district. “The
expert committee has already
submitted its report to the district magistrate,” Soni added.
Soni said he did not know
where the bodies came from
or why they were never cremated, but police have reportedly admitted a lapse in normal
procedures for the disposal of
bodies after post-mortems.
Authorities will now conduct
DNA tests and investigate why
“100 bones and skulls” — some
which date back to the early
1980s — “were left to rot in the
room”, another district police
ofﬁcial said .
Dozens of other skeletons
and decayed body parts have
similarly been discovered in
other parts of Uttar Pradesh,
The Times of India and Mail
Today newspapers reported
yesterday.
AFP
Meanwhile, an Akali Dal delegation
met Home Minister Rajnath Singh and
demanded an SIT to probe the 1984 riots
as per recommendations of the committee. Stating that justice delayed was justice denied, party leader and Delhi Sikh
Gurdwara Committee chief Manjit Singh
G.K. said: “We met the home minister
and told him that the government should
act on the recommendations of the
Justice Mathur report and the SIT must
be constituted with immediate effect.”
IANS
MONDAY 2 FEBRUARY 2015
www.thepeninsulaqatar.com
16
MORNING BREAK
Run through ﬂames
PRAYER TIME
Fajr (Dawn)
4:58
Shorook (Sunrise)
6:17
Zuhr (Noon)
11:48
Asr (Afternoon)
2:56
Maghrib (Sunset)
5:20
Isha (Night)
6:50
WEATHER
Today
Tuesday
Wednesday
Clear
Clear
Partly cloudy
High: 26°
Low: 16°
High: 23°
Low: 17°
Weather
Conditions:
Moderate
temperature
daytime and slight
dust to blowing
dust at places at
times.
High: 24°
Low: 18°
DOHA - SUN & SEA
SUN
TIDE
SEA
SUNRISE | SUNSET
HIGH | LOW
WIND
06:17 17:20
04:30 & 15:30 11:45 & 21:30
18-25/30 KT
TODAY
THE REGION
HI/LO WEATHER
MUSCAT
TOMORROW
26/21
Clear
25/21
Partly cloudy
MAKKAH
35/24
Clear
35/23
Partly cloudy
KUWAIT
24/09
Clear
28/12
Clear
BAHRAIN
22/12
Clear
23/14
Clear
SANAA
24/05
Partly cloudy
25/05
Clear
RIYADH
24/14
Clear
29/15
Partly cloudy
DUBAI
27/16
Clear
29/17
Clear
BAGHDAD
20/08
Clear
23/08
Partly cloudy
TODAY
THE WORLD
HI/LO WEATHER
ATHENS
14/08
Partly cloudy
A competitor runs through ﬂames during the Tough Guy event in Perton, central England, yesterday. The annual event to raise cash for charity challenges
thousands of international competitors in a cross country run followed by an assault course consisting of obstacles including water, ﬁre and tunnels.
HI/LO WEATHER
Campaigners urge UK to
allow ‘3-parent’ IVF babies
TOMORROW
HI/LO WEATHER
14/09
Clear
WASHINGTON
09/-5
Rain
03/-3
Partly cloudy
SYDNEY
24/15
Partly cloudy
24/18
Partly cloudy
LONDON
04/-2
Partly cloudy
06/-1
Mostly cloudy
PARIS
06/01
Chance of showers
ISTANBUL
10/09
Rain
12/07
Partly cloudy
MANILA
27/21
Clear
28/21
04/00
Clear
Cloudy
DHAKA
27/21
Clear
28/21
Clear
DELHI
20/12
Chance of storm
21/11
Clear
ISLAMABAD
15/07
Rain
18/06
Clear
Masks for sale
LONDON: Campaigners urged British
lawmakers yesterday to seize a chance to
become the ﬁrst in the world to allow threeway fertility treatments to families who
want to avoid passing on incurable diseases
to their children.
In an open letter ahead of a parliamentary
vote scheduled for tomorrow, charities and
advocacy groups said the opportunity “offers
families the ﬁrst glimmer of hope that they
might be able to have a baby that will live
without pain and suffering.”
The technique under debate is known as
mitochondrial donation and is often referred
to as three-parent in vitro fertilisation (IVF)
because the offspring would have genes from
a mother, a father and from a female donor.
The process, still only at the research stage
in Britain and the United States, involves
intervening in the fertilisation process to
remove faulty mitochondrial DNA, which can
cause inherited conditions such as fatal heart
problems, liver failure, brain disorders, blindness and muscular dystrophy.
It is feared by critics who say it effectively
allows “designer babies” because it would
involve implanting genetically modiﬁed
embryos into women.
Britain last February set out draft legislation that, if passed, would make it the ﬁrst
country to allow the technique.
In their letter, groups including the
US-based United Mitochondrial Disease
Foundation, the Australian Mitochondrial
Disease Foundation and groups from France,
Germany, Britain and Spain, described mitochondrial disease as “unimaginably cruel”.
“It strips our children of the skills they have
learned, inﬂicts pain that cannot be managed
and tires their organs one by one until their
little bodies cannot go on any more,” they
wrote.
They said they were aware “that no novel
medical procedure is without risk”, but had
“absolute conﬁdence” in scientiﬁc panels that
have examined the technique.
The issue of mitochondrial donation has
been scrutinised by several expert panels in
Britain, including the Human Fertilisation
and Embryology Authority and the Nufﬁeld
Council on Bioethics.
Many scientists and medics have welcomed
the government’s decision to push ahead.
Jeremy Farrar, director of the Wellcome
Trust, said it would “allow the law to catch up
with public and scientiﬁc opinion”.
“Parents who know what it means to care
for a sick and suffering child with mitochondrial disease are the people best placed to
decide ... whether mitochondrial donation is
right for them,” he said. “It is time to allow
them to make that choice.”
REUTERS
Traditional dance
Talk to nurse to ease pain,
anxiety during surgery
Iranian mask artisan Hamid works in his shop “Ca’ del Sol” near St Mark’s
Square during the ﬁrst day of carnival in Venice yesterday.
App to offer sun protection advice
NEW YORK: If your job requires you to stay outdoors for long,
having this app on your smartphone that provides personalised,
real-time advice may improve your sun protection behaviour, says
a study. The Solar Cell app provides sun-protection advice based on
UV (ultraviolet) Index forecasts and personal information from the
users. It also alerts users to apply or reapply sunscreen.
“The Solar Cell mobile app seemed to promote sun protection practices,” the authors noted. The researchers conducted a clinical trial to
evaluate the mobile app by collecting data from a volunteer sample of
202 adults. Of the 96 participants assigned to use the mobile app, 74
individuals (77 percent) used it.
IANS
LONDON: Simple distraction techniques, such
as talking to a nurse, watching a DVD or using
stress balls, can help patients to relax during
varicose vein surgery and reduce their pain, says
a study. “Undergoing conscious surgery can be
a stressful experience for patients,” said study
author professor Jane Ogden from the University
of Surrey in Britain.
“Our research has found a simple and inexpensive
way to improve patients’ experiences of this common
and unpleasant procedure, and could be used for a
wide range of other operations carried out without
a general anesthetic,” Ogden added.
The study involved 398 patients, splitting them
into four groups.
For the ﬁrst group music was played during their
surgery, while the second was offered a choice of
DVD to watch from a wall-mounted monitor.
In the third group, a dedicated nurse was positioned next to the patient’s head to interact with
them throughout the procedure.
In the fourth group, two palm-sized stress balls
were given to participants once they were comfortIANS
ably in place on the operating table.
A ﬂock of starlings is seen as they perform their traditional dance ﬂy before landing to sleep
during the sunset near the southern Arab Israeli city of Rahat, in the northern Israeli Negev
desert, yesterday.
Gaza music school shines in Arabs Got Talent spotlight
GAZA: On the hugely popular Arabs
Got Talent TV show in Beirut last
month, ﬁve young musicians in chequered black-and-white scarves brought
the house down with a traditional
Arabic song that left the judges weeping and earned a ticket straight to the
ﬁnals.
In the Gaza Strip there was much
weeping and celebration too, especially at
the Edward Said National Conservatory
of Music, where the group, made up of
four boys and a girl aged between 12 and
16, learned to play their instruments.
For the past three years, Anas anNajar, a teacher at the conservatory,
has dedicated himself to the band,
honing their skills on the zither, lute,
drum and wooden f lute, while the
fifth member sings in soaring, lilting
melodies.
Because they will perform live on the
ﬁnals show on February 28, Saudi-owned
broadcaster MBC has asked them not to
speak to the media. But their success—
a YouTube video of their performance
has been watched more than 8.7 million
times—has drawn the school where they
practise into the spotlight.
Occupying a single ﬂoor of a nondescript building owned by the Palestinian
Red Crescent Society in Tel al-Hawa, a
middle class neighbourhood of Gaza city,
the conservatory would barely pass notice
from the outside.
On the inside, the walls are lined with
posters of Arab and Western musicians—
Tchaikovsky next to Kamal Al Taweel, a
renowned Egyptian composer—and the
classrooms are a hive of activity as dozens
of students are put through their paces.
Started in 2008 as a project of the
AM Qattan Foundation, which runs cultural programmes in the Arab world, the
school was taken over by the Edward Said
National Conservatory in 2012, becoming its ﬁfth branch in the Palestinian
territories.
Despite three wars in six years and a
blockade imposed by Egypt and Israel,
playing music has steadily gained popularity in Gaza, serving as an outlet in
times of hardship.
More than 250 students now apply to
the conservatory each year, with between
30 and 40 gaining places. The staff of 13
gives lectures on music theory, individual
lessons and instruction for small ensembles to a near-full orchestra.
“Music is able to transfer these students from a world full of pressures to
another more comfortable world,” said
Khamis Abu Sha’ban, the school’s deputy
administrator.
In a rehearsal room, the orchestra is
practising with intensity, the conductor
asking individuals to repeat passages to
get the phrasing precise.
The school, which bought most of its
instruments in Egypt or Syria or received
them as donations from Belgium’s Music
Fund, lends them to the students.
“Music is the language of peace and
harmony,” said 11-year-old Firas Al
Shraﬁ, who has been learning the zither
since he was four. “It brings joy to our
souls at a time of sadness.”
While music may be gaining popularity
among the young in Gaza, it remains less
of a draw than other activities.
As students practised their scales last
week, some 17,000 youngsters graduated
from a week-long military camp run by
Hamas, the Islamist group that has controlled Gaza since 2007.
Still, for those bitten by the music bug
there is one focus:
getting better while cheering on the
ﬁve young Gazans hoping to become
the ﬁrst Palestinians to win “Arabs Got
Talent”.
“A lot of work has been done with those
children,” said Abu Sha’ban of the young
hopefuls. “We wish them victory.”
REUTERS
Congratulations to France
on winning the 24th Men’s
Handball World Championship!
Prestige Partners
All ticket proceeds go to
qatarhandball2015
@2015Handball
@2015Handball
Monday 2 February 2015
13 Rabial II 1436
Volume 19
Number 6329
Price: QR2
www.thepeninsulaqatar.com
[email protected] | [email protected]
Editorial: 44557741 | Advertising: 44557837 / 44557780
MPHC records
QR1.8bn net
proﬁt for 2014
Proposes dividend payout of 77pc
DOHA:
Mesaieed
Petrochemical Holding Company
(MPHC), a subsidiary of Qatar
Petroleum, has recorded a consolidated net proﬁt of QR1.8bn
for the full-year 2014.
MPHC, one of the region’s premier diversiﬁed petrochemical
conglomerates with interests in
the production, distribution and
sale of oleﬁns, polyoleﬁns, alpha
oleﬁns and chlor-alkali products,
reported a revenue of QR4.3bn
during the period. Revenue for
the fourth quarter (Q4, 2014) was
QR1.1bn, a decrease of QR11.5m,
or 1 percent, compared to the
previous quarter of 2014.
The group continued to maintain strong EBITDA margins
across all segments, as results
were aided by resilient key
product prices, supply of competitively priced ethane feedstock
and fuel gas under long-term
supply agreements with Qatar
Petroleum and the recognition
of a tax refund from the Public
Revenues and Tax Department.
These commendable results were
achieved despite its QVC segment
witnessing planned maintenance
during the ﬁrst half of the year,
and heightened operating costs.
Consolidated net proﬁt in the
fourth quarter was QR0.4bn,
a decline of QR0.1bn, or 12.3
percent, versus the third quarter, principally due to a drop in
alpha-oleﬁn sales volume and
prices.
The group’s Q-Chem/Q-Chem
II segment recorded revenue
of QR3.5bn for the year ended
December 31, 2014, while fourth
quarter revenue was QR0.9bn, a
marginal decrease of QR5.7m, or
0.7 percent, from the prior quarter, due to a drop in alpha-oleﬁn
sales volume and prices.
In line with the segment’s
production and sales strategy,
the polyoleﬁn/alpha-oleﬁn sales
mix was adjusted in order to
take advantage of pricing and
market opportunities identiﬁed
during the quarter. As a result,
during the year ended December
31, 2014, polyoleﬁns constituted
71 percent of revenue, alpha-oleﬁns 26 percent with the remainder attributable to other minor
products. Overall, prices of the
company’s key products were
lower in the fourth quarter of
2014 in comparison to the third
quarter of 2014.
EBITDA for the year was
QR2.2bn, and QR 0.5bn for the
quarter. The segment’s commendable quarterly EBITDA
margin of 57.9 percent was
achieved as the companies continued to beneﬁt from excellent
operating results and competitively-priced ethane feedstock
supplied by Qatar Petroleum. Net
proﬁt for the year was QR1.6bn,
while the net proﬁt for the fourth
quarter was QR0.4bn, down by
QR58.1m, or 14.2 percent, from
the previous quarter. The net
proﬁt margin for the fourth
quarter was 40.6 percent.
Total assets of the combined
Q-Chem/Q-Chem II segment
as at December 31, 2014 were
QR7bn, and total debt was
QR1.5bn.
The entire debt balance was
due by Q-Chem II, while the
combined companies’ cash realisation ratio was over 100 percent.
QVC registered full year revenue of QR0.8bn, while the fourth
quarter revenue of QR0.2bn was
marginally down on the previous quarter by QR12.5m, or 5.1
percent.
Net proﬁt for the year ended
December 31, 2014 was QR72.1m,
while EBITDA was QR166.6m.
Fourth quarter earnings were
QR30.1m, an increase of QR6.4m,
or 27.1 percent, against the previous quarter. Year to date proﬁt
margins were adversely affected
by expenditure related to the
major shut-down and weak comparative selling expenses.
The Board of Directors, in
their meeting on January 7, 2015,
recommended a total annual
dividend distribution for the
year ended December 31, 2014
of QR1.4bn. This is equivalent
to a payout of QR1.10 per share
and represents 77 percent of the
group’s proﬁts. This proposed
dividend compares favourably to
the previous distribution amount
of QR439.7m, or QR 0.35 per
share, that was paid for the fourmonth period ended December
31, 2013.
THE PENINSULA
H E Ali Sherif Al Emadi (sixth left), the Minister of Finance and Chairman of the Board of Directors of QNB Group, and other ofﬁcials at the ordinary
general assembly meeting in Doha yesterday.
KAMMUTTY VP
Minister expects 7pc GDP growth in 2015
BY MOHAMMAD SHOEB
DOHA: Qatar’s GDP growth in
2015 is expected to reach seven
percent, with a stable annual
inﬂation rate of three percent,
H E Ali Sherif Al Emadi,
Minister of Finance, said here
yesterday.
He noted that in past years,
Qatar has often made very conservative ﬁnancial policy, saying
the oil price in the current budget
is $65 per barrel, He added that
Qatar sold oil at an average of $85
per barrel since the start of the
year. The ﬁnance minister, who
is also the Chairman of Qatar
National Bank (QNB Group)
Board of Directors, said on the
sidelines of the Bank’s Ordinary
General Assembly meeting: “Our
ﬁnancial position is very strong,
and we expect to realise more profits in 2015,” in his reply about the
possible impact of dwindling oil
prices on the QNB’s project ﬁnancing portfolio.
The General Assembly of QNB
ratiﬁed all items on its agenda,
including the proposal to distribute
a cash dividend of 75 percent of the
nominal share value (representing
QR7.5 per share).
QNB Group last year recorded
a robust growth in its proﬁtability posting a full-year net proﬁt of
QR10.5bn ($2.88bn) for 2014, up
by 10.3 percent compared to 2013,
and total assets increased by 9.7
percent to reach QR486bn.
“It was a historic year for QNB
Group when we managed to realize more than QR10bn proﬁts. We
expanded our operations in Africa,
and currently we are operating in
26 countries in the world. However,
the bank is exploring new opportunities for investment and acquisition,” said the Bank’s Chairman.
He also said that the Group
earned a signiﬁcant QR2.9bn proﬁt
(over 28 percent of the total) from
its overseas operations. However,
he noted that Qatar will continue
to remain as the most important
market and get the highest focus
of the bank followed by GCC and
African markets.
On the issue of non-performing
loans (NPLs) he said that QNB’s
NPL ratio was 1.6 percent, which
was lower than the two percent
general average of banks operating in Qatar.
While on the bank’s capital
adequacy ratio he highlighted that
it was 14 percent higher than the
required ratio, and the Bank is
ready to implement Basel norms.
The meeting also approved the
appointment of Ernst & Young
as External Auditors for the year
2015 in yesterday’s meeting.
The Chairman said QNB
Group’s success in maintaining
momentum across all its activities was reﬂected in the strong
2014 ﬁnancial results. Driven by
the dual considerations of on-going
domestic and international expansion along with the continuing
adoption of a prudent approach to
risk management, QNB had established its position as one of the
World’s Strongest Banks and reafﬁrmed its status as the leading
ﬁnancial institution in the Mena
region.
He also provided an overview of
the Bank’s business plans for 2015.
Retaining its leading position
through the continued diversiﬁcation of income sources and expanding the range of product offerings’
across the QNB Group was of primary focus. The continued ability
to meet shareholders’ expectations
remained a core consideration for
THE PENINSULA
2015.
Vodafone Qatar becomes fully Shariah-compliant
DOHA: Vodafone Qatar yesterday announced it has completed
the process to become a fully
Shariah-compliant
company.
Professor Dr Ali Qaradaghi,
commissioned
by
Vodafone
Qatar’s Board of Directors with
the responsibility of transforming the company to become fully
Shariah-compliant, explained the
steps and procedures taken so far
towards achieving the goal.
Prof Qaradaghi said Vodafone
Qatar successfully reﬁnanced its
conventional interest-bearing
borrowings with a Shariahcompliant ‘wakala’ investment
agreement in December. The transition was completed in accordance
with the current, effective laws that
do not contradict Shariah rules.
A Shariah compliance review
was conducted by the Islamic
Finance consultant. This included
bank accounts, deposits, investments, current debts, secured
agreements and cash transactions;
also accounts receivable, debts
deducted and employee loans.
The review also covered other
agreements and contracts including rent, oversight bodies and
service franchises and other commercial matters. Vodafone Qatar
said all these activities have been
performed under the supervision of
Prof Qaradaghi, followed by a comments review and the arrangement
of Shariah-compliant alternatives
when necessary. All non-compliant
activities have been discontinued.
“Based on all the above brieﬂy
mentioned description, Vodafone
Qatar has become qualiﬁed to
commit to the Shariah rules and
start its Shariah-compliant operations starting with January 1,
2015. Therefore, as of this date,
Vodafone Qatar is a Shariah compliant company whose shares can
be traded — bought and sold —
without religious disconcertment
or the need for money puriﬁcation.”
Professor Dr Ali Qaradaghi said.
Prof Qaradaghi expressed his sincere thanks to Sheikh Dr Khalid
bin Thani Al Thani, Chairman of
Vodafone Qatar, and the board of
directors for their important decision.
THE PENINSULA
Net capital outﬂows up
Aer Lingus sale: Irish PM
wants ‘cast iron’ guarantee
People prepare a sled in the form of the Russian rouble during the Winter Sledge festival in St Petersburg
yesterday. Net capital outﬂows from Russia more than doubled in 2014 to $151.5bn.
DUBLIN: The owner of British
Airways must provide some
sort of “cast iron permanent
guarantee” on ﬂights to Ireland
if the government is to even
consider its bid for Aer Lingus,
Prime Minister Enda Kenny
said yesterday.
Aer Lingus’s board on Tuesday
recommended a €1.36bn offer
from International Consolidated
Airlines Group (IAG), subject to
the agreement of its two largest
shareholders — budget airline
Ryanair and the Irish state.
Under pressure from the airline’s trade unions and opponents in parliament, resistance
is building within government
around parting with its 25 percent holding, weighing on the
airline’s shares as IAG decides
on a formal bid. “If IAG are
going to come to the table in the
next few days, then I need to
see, in so far as this is possible,
a cast iron permanent guarantee in respect of connectivity for
Cork, for Shannon, Dublin and a
lesser extent Knock,” Kenny told
national broadcaster RTE, referring to regions the airline ﬂies to.
“I’m also cognisant of the voices
of those far more experienced
in business than I who say that
this kind of guarantee might be
difﬁcult to get... We’re in a limited
inﬂuential position here.”
Kenny said such guarantees
would only form part of the
government’s decision but later
wrote on his Twitter page that
they would be needed “before gov
can even consider selling its stake
in Aer Lingus.”
A successful takeover would
give IAG more take-off and landing slots at London Heathrow
Airport, BA’s home base and a
major European hub for international ﬂights. Government MPs
fear some slots would no longer
be used to service Ireland.
REUTERS
MONDAY 2 FEBRUARY 2015
www.thepeninsulaqatar.com
22
BUSINESS
QE index rebounds to 12,000 level
Bourse gains 162.47 points to close at 12,062
DOHA: Qatar stocks rose sharply yesterday
on improved oil prices and corporate dividend payouts. The main index jumped 162.47
points, or 1.37 percent, to close at 12,062.
Industrials and real estate were the best
performing sectors. Industrials Index rose 1.94
percent and real estate soared 1.58 percent.
International Islamic, Industries Qatar,
Gulf International, Barwa and Vodafone were
the top gainers. Rising oil prices boosted the
market sentiments, industrial, real estate and
banking stocks gave the push to the market,
analysts noted.
International Islamic rose 3.35 percent and
Industries Qatar edged 2.35 percent up. Gulf
International soared 3.20 percent and Vodafone
gained 2.55 percent.
Gulf International was the most active
stock with a traded value of QR113.5m, or 27.2
percent of the market’s total traded value.
Vodafone Qatar led the trading volume with
2.19 million shares, or 21.5 percent of the total.
Total trading volume rose to over 10 million shares from 8.48 million shares, and total
traded value rose to QR417m from QR374.50m.
Market capitalisation rose to QR656bn from
the previous session’s QR648bn.
Elsewhere, Saudi index jumped 3.0 percent
in heavy trade to 9,144 points, breaking above
chart resistance on the late December peak
at 8,948 points; the next resistance is on the
100-day average, now at 9,436 points, Reuters
reported.
Dubai’s index jumped 4.5 percent to close at
3,840 points, its biggest daily gain in six weeks.
Trading volume also rose in a positive technical sign.
Conglomerate Dubai Investments led gains
and surged 13.8 percent after it said its board
had proposed a higher dividend for 2014: 12
percent cash and 6 percent bonus shares. This
compared with a 7 percent cash dividend and 7
percent bonus shares in the year-earlier period.
Abu Dhabi’s index jumped 2.2 percent on
the back of large banks. National Bank of Abu
Dhabi surged 4.3 percent, First Gulf Bank rose
2.9 percent and Abu Dhabi Commercial Bank
added 3.2 percent. The sector has reported generally strong fourth-quarter results.
Markets in Kuwait and Oman added 1.0 and
0.2 percent respectively. Egypt’s bourse edged
THE PENINSULA
0.6 percent down.
QE to host WFE meet
DOHA: Qatar Exchange (QE) will
host the 55th General Assembly
and Annual Meeting of the World
Federation of Exchanges (WFE) in
October 2015. The WFE is also the
world’s largest gathering of exchanges
as it is the trade association of 64
publicly regulated stock, futures and
options exchanges from all over the
world, in addition to other afﬁliate and
correspondent members.
The 2014 WFE General Assembly and
Annual Meeting was held in the Korean
capital, Seoul, during which Rashid bin
Ali Al Mansoori, CEO of QE was elected
as a Board Member of the WFE to represent Europe-Middle East-Africa region
for three-year term.
Several key issues will be discussed at
the WFE meetings. They include the role
of stock exchanges in serving national
economies, their contribution to the
overall development and sustainability
efforts, their role in encouraging investments and the private sector through
SME’s exchange markets, in addition to
discussing some other issues related to
stock market strategies and performance, the development of derivatives and
bonds markets, and the challenges facing
emerging and developed markets.
Al Mansoori said: “The hosting of
this major international event in Qatar
is an important achievement for Qatar
Exchange….We are happy to be part of
an organisation that represents markets
worldwide that are fair, transparent, well
regulated and that play an important
role in the economies of our respective
countries”.
“We look at this meeting as an
opportunity to exchange views in order
to strengthen the means of cooperation between the participating stock
exchanges and ﬁnd solutions to the difﬁculties and challenges that may face
those exchanges, especially in light of
the rapid economic, social and political
changes all over the world,” he added.
THE PENINSULA
Protest against privatisation
Obama plans 19pc
tax on foreign
earnings of US ﬁrms
WASHINGTON: US President
Barack Obama’s ﬁscal 2016
budget proposes a 19 percent
tax on US companies future
foreign earnings and a onetime 14 percent tax on roughly
$2 trillion of proﬁts being held
offshore, the White House said
yesterday.
Revenues from the one-time
tax would be used to fund infrastructure projects and ﬁll a projected shortfall in the Highway
Trust Fund. The budget, which
is set for release today, is as much
a political document as a ﬁscal
roadmap. It requires approval
from Congress to take effect and
full approval by the Republicancontrolled legislature is very
unlikely.
The White House has long been
critical of practices by US companies that it views as avoiding tax
responsibilities at home. The proposals are part of a broader tax
reform package that the Obama
administration hopes will re-focus
tax advantages toward middleincome Americans.
“This transition tax would
mean that companies have to pay
US tax right now on the $2 trillion they already have overseas,
rather than being able to delay
paying any US tax indeﬁnitely,” a
White House ofﬁcial said. “Unlike
a voluntary repatriation holiday,
which the president opposes and
which would lose revenue, the
president’s proposed transition
tax is a one-time, mandatory tax
on previously untaxed foreign
earnings, regardless of whether
the earnings are repatriated.”
Obama’s proposal is aimed at
closing a tax loophole that lets
multinationals avoid paying taxes
on proﬁts earned abroad, or that
they shift into foreign countries
from the United States to reduce
their US taxable income.
Corporations have been pushing for years for a tax holiday
that would let them repatriate
such earnings at a discounted tax
rate. This was tried in 2004 under
former Republican President
George W Bush. Framed as an
economic stimulus, the Bush
measure did result in a substantial
portion of deferred proﬁts being
repatriated, but studies showed it
did little for the economy.
The Obama budget also proposes that US companies pay a
19 percent tax on all foreign earnings as they are earned, while a
tax credit would be issued for foreign taxes paid.
“After this initial payment, foreign earnings could be reinvested
in the US without additional tax,
which would level the playing
ﬁeld, and encourage ﬁrms to create jobs here at home,” the ofﬁcial
said. The corporate tax rate is 35
percent but abundant loopholes
allow many major corporations to
avoid paying altogether.
Republicans have said tax
reform is one area where they
hope to ﬁnd compromises with
Democrats and the White House,
though Obama’s proposals have so
far received a lukewarm reception. Foreign corporate earnings
can be held offshore for years if
they are classiﬁed as indeﬁnitely
REUTERS
invested abroad.
A protester holds a poster reading ‘Don’t cover your eyes’ as hundreds of other protesters join hands against
the privatisation of the airline TAP Portugal.
FRANKFURT: The ﬁnance
chief of Ford Motor Co expects
ongoing problems in Russia
where the decline of the rouble
and the struggling economy was
weighing on its market share,
according to German newspaper Handelsblatt.
Russia’s currency and economic
woes were cited last week by
Ford as major reasons the company lowered expectations for its
European business in 2015. Other
carmakers have incurred losses
and closed production plants in
Russia for the same reason.
“2015 does not look good,”
Ford’s Chief Financial Ofﬁcer
Bob Shanks was quoted as saying about Russia in an interview
to be published today.
Shanks told the ﬁnancial daily
that Ford has lost market share in
Russia as “a number of competitors have aggressively cut their
prices.”
Japanese car makers were able
to cut prices on the back of the
weak yen and Korean car makers
had followed, he said.
Shanks said that Ford was
looking at measures to cope with
the Russian crisis. “All options are
on the table,” he was quoted as
saying.
A market exit was not an
option, Shank said.
Ford spokespeople in Europe
could not immediately be reached
for comment outside ofﬁce hours.
Ford had previously estimated
losses from Europe at about
$250m in 2015.
On Thursday, however, it
backed away from that forecast,
saying the loss would narrow from
$1bn in 2014 but would be wider
than previously thought.
General Motors Co said last
week it will suspend production at
its St. Petersburg auto assembly
plant in Russia from mid-March
to mid-May and is raising prices
for its products because of the
weak and volatile Russian rouble.
REUTERS
EU, US look for ‘fresh start’ in trade talks
BRUSSELS: US negotiators
travel to EU headquarters in
Brussels today to jumpstart
talks on the world’s biggestever free trade deal, which after
nearly two years remain bogged
down by public opposition.
The future of the Transatlantic
Trade and Investment Pact, or
TTIP, is in doubt in the face of
bitter opposition by activists and
mixed signals from key governments, including Europe’s biggest
economy Germany. “This is the
dirtiest trade deal in Europe’s history,” a new video posted by the
anti-TTIP group Corporate Europe
said. Particularly controversial
is a plan to let companies have
legal disputes with governments
heard by supra-national tribunals,
which campaigners say would
undermine national sovereignty
and favour corporations.
The historic drive to create a
market of 850 million people, linking the 28-nation European Union
and the United States, began 20
months ago and on the eve of
the eighth round of talks many
believe the process is at a makeor-break stage.
The four days of talks starting
Monday will be the ﬁrst since the
new European Commission led by
Jean-Claude Juncker took ofﬁce
in November, with the outspoken Swede Cecilia Malmstroem
charged to salvage the talks as
the new trade commissioner.
“This is the ﬁrst round after the
fresh start. I am very curious how
things have developed,” said Luisa
Santos of Business Europe, an
inﬂuential pro-business and proTTIP lobby in Brussels.
The ambitious pact would be
unique in history, analysts said.
It would not just slash the
already low trade tariffs between
the world’s two top economies, but
crucially it would also harmonise
regulations to an unprecedented
degree, affecting goods and services as far-ranging as Roquefort
cheese and accounting.
“We are dealing mainly with
regulation and more speciﬁcally,
de-regulation,” said Tom Jenkins,
a senior advisor at ETUC, a
European trade union group.
“People are quizzical to say the
very least,” he said.
Campaigners are convinced
that powerful interests are selling the consumer short in secret
negotiations. But instead of setting aside negative opinion, as is
often the case in the early rounds
of trade talks, the EU decided to
face the critics, embracing dialogue and transparency, at least
to a degree.
“We are aware of the sensitivities, of all the concerns and criticisms,” an EU source told AFP.
“We are also aware of our own
efforts towards transparency and
we are also aware that more can
be done.”
AFP
Market-opening plan on
track: Saudi regulator
Gulf Air achieves
maintenance
milestone
DOHA: Gulf Air, the national
carrier of the Kingdom of
Bahrain, has marked the successful insourcing and completion of a C1 Check on its Airbus
321, ahead of schedule. Carried
out by the airline’s engineers
and technicians this achievement reinforces Gulf Air’s
technical capabilities — delivering Gulf Air’s ﬁrst insourced C1
Check in 25 years.
Gulf Air’s Acting Chief
Technical Ofﬁcer Jamal Hashim
said: “Today’s achievement is a
clear demonstration of Gulf Air’s
in-house engineering capabilities
and strengths that reﬂect the
ongoing training and development of our team , delivering
several major milestones in the
past such as the recent insourcing
of ourAirbus A330 18-Month and
42-Month Checks. I would like
to congratulate Gulf Air’s entire
technical team for completing
Ford CFO
sees ongoing
problems
in Russia
The Gulf Air team after the completion of the C1 Check.
this major check at the highest
level of workmanship and efﬁciency. I look forward to realising
further milestones in our strategy
in future.”
In line with the airline’s ongoing efforts to streamline its
operations for greater efﬁciency
and cost reduction, Gulf Air’s
Technical Division has successfully insourced the C1/C3 Checks
on its A320/A321 ﬂeet and 18/48Month Checks on its A330 ﬂeet
in a move that underscores the
airline’s engineering expertise
and technical capabilities. The
national carrier is also currently
performing A320 20-Month
Checks in addition to the A
Checks, Out-of-Phase Checks
and Line Maintenance, for its allAirbus ﬂeet, the airline said in a
statement.
THE PENINSULA
RIYADH: The new head
of Saudi Arabia’s securities
regulator said the kingdom
remained on track to open its
$510bn stock market to direct
foreign investment in the ﬁrst
half of this year.
Mohammed Al Jadaan, founding partner at law ﬁrm Al Jadaan
& Partners in Riyadh, was named
head of the Capital Market
Authority in the latest cabinet
resufﬂe on Thursday. He replaced
Mohammed bin Abdulmalik Al
Sheikh, who also had a lawyer’s
background.
“The CMA is committed to
open the market to foreign investors in the ﬁrst half of this year.
This decision is very important
and has huge beneﬁts, and we
have institutional commitment
to it,” Jadaan was quoted as
saying in an interview with the
Saudi-owned al-Hayat newspaper
yesterday.
He praised the work of the
previous CMA management and
said there would be “no major
changes” in the direction of its
work.
“I look forward to increasing
the number of listed companies...
The stock market needs a larger
number of listed ﬁrms to cope up
with the huge size of the Saudi
economy...The CMA will exert all
possible efforts to go ahead with
improvement.”
As a lawyer, Jadaan worked on
Islamic ﬁnance in Saudi Arabia
and advised international investment banks on regulatory and
structuring issues, focusing on
complex litigation, mediation
and strategic advice, according
to his law ﬁrm’s website. He was
a special advisor to global law ﬁrm
Clifford Chance.
He was also an advisor to
the CMA and to Saudi Arabia’s
Supreme Economic Council,
a body for policy discussion.
REUTERS
MONDAY 2 FEBRUARY 2015
www.thepeninsulaqatar.com
BUSINESS
23
Greece rejects new loans as money runs out
Economists wondering how long Greece can survive
ATHENS: The decision by
Greece’s anti-austerity government in Athens to refuse fresh
EU-IMF loans has set economists guessing how long Greece’s
meagre
ﬁnances
can
last.
“From what I hear, Greece can
barely hold on until February,”
Alexandre Delaigue, economics
professor at the French military
academy Saint-Cyr, said.
The new hard-left government
of Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras
(pictured) that took over after
the January 25 general election
faces a daunting debt repayment
schedule this year.
It must repay €9bn to the
International Monetary Fund this
year, including €2.3bn in February
and March, according to BNP
Paribas. There is subsequently
another €6.7bn in bonds held by
the European Central Bank which
must be paid in July and August,
and €15bn in short-term debt held
by Greek banks owed throughout
this year.
Greece’s rejection of new
EU-IMF loans, and its insistence
in talking directly to its international creditors without the
intervention of lower-level ﬁscal auditors, has alarmed ﬁnancial markets. The yield on Greek
10-year bonds now exceeds 11
percent, an impossible rate for
Greece to borrow at today were it
to attempt to raise money without
EU-IMF protection.
After rebufﬁng the committee
of EU-IMF ﬁscal auditors known
as the ‘troika’, which Finance
Minister Yanis Varoufakis dismissed as “rotten” and “antiEuropean”, Greece is asking
creditors for time. “We need
time to breathe and create our
own medium-term recovery programme, which amongst other
things will incorporate the targets of primary balanced budgets
and radical reforms to address the
issues of tax evasion, corruption
and clientelistic policies,” Tsipras
said in a statement to Bloomberg.
The Greek ﬁnance ministry on
Saturday said it had hired advisory investment bankers Lazard
“to advise on issues of public debt
and ﬁscal management”.
Lazard in 2012 had assisted
Athens in brokering a 50-percent
writedown on the country’s short
French Finance Minister Michel Sapin (right) and Greek Finance Minister Yanis Varoufakis (left) attend a meeting
at the Bercy Finance Ministry in Paris yesterday.
ECB ofﬁcial says Greek
lending could stop by March
HELSINKI: A top European Central Bank ofﬁcial said that
the institution cannot keep lending money to Greece unless the
heavily indebted nation extends its bailout programme before a
February deadline. The remarks from Bank of Finland Governor
Erkki Liikanen — who sits on the ECB’s governing council —come
one month before the bailout programme agreed upon by Greece
with Europe and the IMF is set to expire.
“Signiﬁcant debt restructuring has been carried out with private
investors. The ECB cannot fund a state directly, which is what it
would mean in this case,” Liikanen said.
Following Syriza’s victory Finnish Prime Minister Alexander
Stubb said he opposed debt relief but would consider extending
Greece’s loan repayment period.
AFP
and medium-term debt.
Lazard CEO Matthieu Pigasse
had said ahead of Saturday’s
announcement that it was “absolutely necessary” to reduce half
the Greek debt held by public
institutions, effectively a cut of
around €100bn.
Tsipras’ administration has
promised to pull Greece out of
a “humanitarian crisis” caused
by ﬁve years of ﬁscal cuts with a
stimulus programme estimated
to be worth around €13.5bn,
according to BNP Paribas. The
government says it can ﬁnd the
money by closing tax loopholes
employed by wealthy Greeks and
by cracking down on smuggling
and corruption. Domestic critics
note that similar pledges by the
socialist administration of George
Papandreou in 2009 bore little
fruit. Ahead of the election, many
Greeks stopped paying their taxes
and state coffers are nearly empty.
Greek daily Kathimerini has
noted that less than €2bn remain,
and will be used up by the end of
February. “The government is able
to ﬁnance itself because Greek
banks buy its short-term debt
issues, and because the European
Central Bank supports them. If
the ECB turns the tap off, it’s
over,” warned Delaigue.
AFP
Athens starts drive to sell new
debt deal to doubting Europe
ATHENS: Greece’s leftist government yesterday
began its drive to persuade a sceptical Europe to
accept a new debt agreement while it starts to
roll back on austerity measures imposed under its
existing bailout agreement.
After a turbulent ﬁrst week in ofﬁce, the new government has made clear it wants to end the existing
arrangement with the European Union, the European
Central Bank and International Monetary Fund
“troika” when its aid deadline expires on February 28.
Instead, Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras wants to
agree a bridging deal with the troika while a new
agreement is negotiated to reduce Greece’s unmanageable public debt burden of more than 175 percent
of its economic output is worked out.
Finance Minister Yanis Varoufakis, who spoke
to US Treasury Secretary Jack Lew on Friday, has
started a diplomatic offensive in Paris yesterday,
where he met French counterpart Michel Sapin
and Economy Minister Emmanuel Macron. He goes
to London to see British Finance Minister George
Osborne today and travels to Rome on Tuesday.
Before the meeting Sapin repeated that Greece
could not expect its partners to accept a straight
debt write off. But he left the door open to other
options that could include giving Athens more time
for repayment. “No we will not annul, we can discuss, we can delay, we can reduce its weight, but not
annul,” he told Canal Plus television.
Tsipras himself is due this week in Rome and
Paris, the two major capitals where his hopes for
a sympathetic hearing are highest given French
and Italian calls for an easing in rigid eurozone
budget austerity. He is also due to meet European
Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker but
has yet to say if and when he might meet German
Chancellor Angela Merkel or Finance Minister
Wolfgang Schaeuble who refuse to consider any writedown of Greek debt.
At home, where Greeks have seen poverty and
hardship reach levels unmatched anywhere else in
western Europe, the government has wasted little
time in making clear it intends to respect its election
promises to end years of harsh austerity.
It has halted a series of privatisations it says
amount to a disposal of strategic national assets at
ﬁre-sale prices and has announced plans to reinstate
thousands of public sector workers laid off by the last
government. Labour Minister Panos Skourletis said
the government would restore collective bargaining
and raise the minimum wage — cut to €586 ($660)
from €751 a month under the 2012 bailout agreement.
Tsipras is expected to give more detail when he
lays out his programme in parliament in the next few
days. Skourletis said the government would discuss
the minimum wage plans with unions and employers
before moving ahead.
European partners, including the head of the euro
zone ﬁnance ministers’ group Jeroen Dijsselbloem,
have already made clear they doubt the Tsipras government can meet its election pledges while keeping
public ﬁnances on track.
REUTERS
IMF chief in Senegal
Zain Q4 net proﬁt falls
as currency swings bite
Massar
Solutions
postpones
UAE ﬂotation
DUBAI: Abu Dhabi-based ﬂeet
manager
Massar
Solutions
has postponed its initial share
sale after the planned ﬂotation
failed to secure enough investor
backing during the subscription
period, a report by United Arab
Emirates’ daily The National
said yesterday.
Signiﬁcantly less than half
of the shares in the Dh576m
($156.8m) initial public offering
(IPO) were taken up by local
retail and institutional investors
for whom they were reserved, the
paper reported, citing an advisory
source familiar with the matter.
Massar’s listing is now being
reviewed by the advisers and the
markets regulator, the Securities
and Commodities Authority
(SCA). The company was selling
a 40 percent stake provided by
existing shareholders Invest AD, a
local ﬁnancial ﬁrm, and Abu Dhabi
National Energy Co (TAQA)
between January 11 and 25.
A spokesman for Massar
declined to comment when contacted. Should the postponement
be conﬁrmed, it will be a blow to
the Abu Dhabi bourse and other
companies in the UAE which were
hoping to go public in the nearterm. Massar would have been the
ﬁrst listing in Abu Dhabi since
2011, as investor sentiment suffered in the wake of the ﬁnancial
crisis but was improving after
rebounds in UAE markets since
2013. However, the decline in oil
prices had increased volatility on
Gulf bourses and the head of the
SCA said a number of companies
were delaying listing plans.
REUTERS
International Monetary Fund Managing Director Christine Lagarde with Senegal’s Finance Minister
Amadou Ba (left) at the “door of no return” during a tour of Goree Island.
DUBAI: Zain Group, Kuwait’s
No.1 telecom operator by subscribers, reported a 35 percent
drop in fourth-quarter proﬁt
yesterday, extending a slump as
foreign currency volatility hurt
its earnings once again.
The former monopoly, which
operates in eight countries in the
Middle East and Africa, made a
net proﬁt of KD33m ($112.2m) in
the three months to December 31,
it said in a statement, without
providing a year earlier ﬁgure.
The ﬁrm posted falling proﬁts
in seven of the preceding nine
quarters as revenue was dented
by intense domestic competition,
service interruptions in Iraq and
declines in the value of Sudan’s
currency, where it is the biggest
operator. The company said currency variations cost it KD12m in
the fourth quarter of 2014, more
than the KD10m it cost them in
the same period of 2013.
Zain did not give further details
on currency changes for the quarterly period but said its full-year
numbers had been impacted by
the appreciation of the US dollar against the Kuwaiti dinar,
along with currency losses in
Sudan and Iraq. Chief Executive
Scott Gegenheimer said 2014
was “especially challenging” due
to factors beyond Zain’s control,
which contrasted with “the sound
operational progress and transformation we have undertaken
across all our markets”.
Zain made a 2014 annual proﬁt
of KD194m, without providing a
year-earlier ﬁgure. The company previously reported it made
KD216.4m in 2013.
REUTERS
India economic growth revised up by almost 50pc
NEW DELHI: India’s economy
grew almost 50 percent faster
in 2013-14 than earlier thought,
the government said after
changing a formula, a reminder
of the challenges that unreliable statistics present to Indian
policymakers.
In the year leading up to the
elections that brought Prime
Minister Narendra Modi to
power last May, the economy
grew 6.9 percent, not the 4.7 percent reported earlier, chief statistician TCA Anant told reporters.
Modi’s campaign succeeded
partly because of the widespread
feeling that his predecessors from
the Congress party had plunged
the economy into the country’s
longest deceleration in growth in
a generation.
The revised formula, showing
a faster recovery, includes underrepresented and informal sectors
as well as items such as smartphones and LED television sets in
gross domestic product.
That could boost India’s growth
ﬁgure in the year ending in
March 2015, which the Reserve
Bank of India (RBI) has projected
to be around 5.5 percent.
Some in government predict
the change will help bring down
the ﬁscal deﬁcit as a share of
gross domestic product, making
it easier for Modi to trim the gap
to a seven-year low of 4.1 percent
in the year to March despite a
shortfall in revenue.
However, Anant said the overall size of India’s $1.8 trillion
economy had not changed enough
to shift the ratio signiﬁcantly,
adding: “Our ranking in GDP
terms will not change as the size
of economy has almost remained
the same.”
The new methodology moves
India more in line with global
standards by measuring the economy at market prices, and by
tracking consumer rather than
wholesale inﬂation. “This will
help lower market distortions
and give better representation
to the manufacturing sector,”
said Soumya Kanti Ghosh, chief
economic adviser at State Bank
of India.
But the frequent GDP revisions and other deﬁcient data
are a headache for economic
planners.
Among the worst offenders are the volatile index for
industrial production and the
jobless numbers, seen as very
unrepresentative.
The latest GDP revision is part
of a change to the method of calculating national accounts that
happens every ﬁve years.
“It is a problem for the government and economists who
are trying to understand the
exact situation,” said DH Pai
Panandiker, president of RPG
Foundation, an economic policy
group in New Delhi.
“It is even a problem for the
RBI, that doesn’t have a full view
about how the economy is performing,” he added. REUTERS
MONDAY 2 FEBRUARY 2015
www.thepeninsulaqatar.com
24
BUSINESS
China manufacturing unexpectedly shrinks in January
BEIJING: China’s manufacturing activity contracted for
the ﬁrst time in more than two
years in January, an ofﬁcial survey showed yesterday, signalling further downward pressure
on the world’s second-largest
economy.
The
ofﬁcial
Purchasing
Managers’ Index (PMI) released
by the National Bureau of
Statistics (NBS) came in at
49.8 last month, down from 50.1
recorded in December.
The index, which tracks activity
in factories and workshops, is
considered a key indicator of
the health of China’s economy, a
major driver of global growth. A
ﬁgure above 50 signals expansion,
while anything below indicates
contraction.
January’s ﬁgure was the ﬁrst
contraction for 27 months.
British banking giant HSBC
said last month that a preliminary
reading of its own PMI edged up to
49.8 in January from a ﬁnal reading of 49.6 in December. It was
at the break-even point of 50.0
in November. The bank is scheduled to release its ﬁnal PMI ﬁgure
today. ANZ Banking Group said
in a research report that the NBS
ﬁgures were unexpected, particularly given “favourable seasonal
factors”.
“The Chinese New Year falls
into late February this year, while
it was in late January last year,”
ANZ said. “Past experience suggests that there could be signiﬁcant front loading effect before the
Chinese New Year, which would
provide short-term impetus to the
manufacturing industry.”
China’s central bank surprised
economists in November by cutting benchmark interest rates for
the ﬁrst time in more than two
years, in a move interpreted as
an attempt to shore up ﬂagging
growth.
The People’s Bank of China lowered its one-year rate for deposits
by 25 basis points to 2.75 percent
and its one-year lending rate by 40
basis points to 5.6 percent.
The Chinese economy is struggling with not just stalling factory
growth, but also other problems
including soft exports and the
weakening property market.
It grew 7.4 percent in 2014,
slower than the 7.7 percent in 2013
and the worst since the 3.8 percent
recorded in 1990.
Authorities had for months used
various kinds of limited stimulatory measures such as targeted
cuts in bank reserve requirements
— aimed at freeing up funds for
lending — and a cash injection into
the country’s ﬁve biggest banks for
re-lending. But top leaders say
they are ready to tolerate slower
expansion and will avoid aggressive measures to boost growth as
the government seeks to shift the
economy away from its dependence on investment and exports
towards more sustainable consumer-driven growth.
Premier Li Keqiang said last
month at the World Economic
Forum in Davos that he was determined to bring changes that would
deliver “quality growth” rather
than just a high top-line ﬁgure.
AFP
Foreign ﬁrms prepare
for new China tax rules
Beijing vows to curb cross-border tax avoidance
BEIJING: The Chinese government’s vow to increase tax
scrutiny of foreign companies
has sent ﬁrms rushing to tax
advisers ahead of the implementation yesterday of new rules
designed to rein in cross-border
tax avoidance.
Tax professionals and business lobbies alike have welcomed
the move as an attempt to bring
China’s tax regime more in line
with international standards.
But it has also caused concern
that authorities could use the
policy, which came into effect on
February 1, as a political tool to
put the pinch on foreign companies, on top of what business
lobbies lament is an increasingly
tough business climate in the
world’s second largest economy.
“We’ve deﬁnitely been getting
a lot of questions from clients on
how to avoid being investigated
for anti-avoidance measures,” said
Roberta Chang, a Shanghai-based
tax lawyer at Hogan Lovells.
The measures, an elaboration
on China’s existing “general antiavoidance rule” or GAAR framework, have more companies taking
a hard look at how they structure
their businesses. Under the new
policy, for example, a ﬁrm that
invests in China through companies in Hong Kong or Singapore
to take advantage of tax beneﬁts
that do not exist between China
and its home country could ﬁnd
itself on the wrong side of Beijing
tax authorities if it cannot prove it
has substantial business operations
there or employees on the ground.
“Companies are increasingly
putting substance in their holding companies,” Chang said.
Andrew Choy, Greater China
International Tax Services Leader
at Ernst & Young, said the GAAR
rules are a signal that companies
need to pay attention to tax planning. “In general, people will be
more conservative,” Choy said.
Chinese regulators hit Microsoft
Corp with about $140m in back
taxes last November, an early
case of what could be a wave of
“targeted actions” to stop proﬁts
going overseas, according ofﬁcials
at China’s State Administration
of Taxation.
With a slowing economy likely
to reduce 2015 ﬁscal revenue
growth to a three-decade low
of just 1 percent, according to a
JPMorgan to
pay $99.5m
to end rigging
lawsuit
GM, SAIC to push into Indonesia with no-frills vans
NEW YORK: JPMorgan Chase
& Co, the largest US bank,
agreed to pay $99.5m to settle
its portion of an antitrust lawsuit in which investors accuse
12 major banks of rigging prices
in the $5.3 trillion-a-day foreign
exchange market.
The settlement is the ﬁrst in the
nationwide litigation and resolved
claims over JPMorgan’s role in
alleged collusion among banks
since January 2003 to manipulate
the WM/Reuters Closing Spot
Rates, known as the Fix. It followed the New York-based bank’s
agreements last November to pay
roughly $1bn in civil penalties to
resolve related claims by US and
European regulators.
Investors including hedge
funds, pension funds and the city
of Philadelphia accused the 12
banks, which controlled 84 percent of the global currency trading market, of having impeded
competition by conspiring to
manipulate the Fix in chat rooms,
instant messages and emails.
The JPMorgan settlement
could form a basis for other settlements. It followed mediation
with Kenneth Feinberg, a lawyer
who also oversees General Motors
Co’s program to compensate drivers over faulty vehicle ignition
switches. In an afﬁdavit, Feinberg
called the JPMorgan settlement
fair, reasonable and adequate.
“Although such analysis is preliminary, it does appear to be consistent with Class Lead Counsel’s
evaluation of JPMorgan’s role in
the FX market and JPMorgan’s
market share over the class
period (6percent),” he said.
JPMorgan did not admit
wrongdoing, and the settlement
requires court approval.
REUTERS
BEIJING: General Motors and
Chinese partner SAIC Motor
Corp will soon announce a joint
push into Indonesia, using their
no-frills Wuling brand to establish a beachhead in Southeast
Asia’s biggest market and from
there tackle other markets in
the region.
They have already made moves
to purchase a property in an
industrial district on the outskirts
of Jakarta, according to two people familiar with the matter, and
are expected to detail within days
what GM China chief Matt Tsien
called an important joint venture
in a country of 240 million people.
In a report, ofﬁcials from
Indonesia’s industry ministry
told state Antara news agency
Deutsche Bank report, it makes
sense for Beijing to try to boost its
coffers. Tax specialists say companies need to be aware that China’s
tax regime is evolving, albeit as
part of a global trend to curb tax
avoidance.
At a meeting of G20 leaders in
Australia in November, Chinese
President Xi Jinping endorsed
a global effort to crack down on
international tax avoidance.
“Compared to the US or the
UK, China’s tax rules are still simpler. But China doesn’t want to be
seen as an undeveloped country
with tax rules. It wants to catch
up to other international players,”
Chang, of Hogan Lovells said.
At the forefront of evolving
international tax policy is the
debate about whether the right
to tax should be tilted towards
industrialised, capital exporting
countries where ﬁrms reside, or
so-called source countries such
as China, where many generate signiﬁcant proﬁt. “There is a
large element from a government
policy perspective that has to do
with whether China is going to tax
particular proﬁts or some other
country,” said Jon Eichelberger, a
that GM and SAIC would invest
a total of $700m in Indonesia to
set up operations to manufacture
and market Wuling vehicles in
the country.
GM and SAIC, according to the
report, plan to start construction
of the Wuling assembly plant in
August 2015 with an aim to commence production in 2017. The
factory will have capacity to produce 150,000 vehicles a year. The
report followed a visit to the ministry on Friday by a delegation of
GM and SAIC ofﬁcials, according
to Antara.
A GM spokeswoman in
Shanghai said she could not conﬁrm details in the report.
For GM, Indonesia will be its
second non-China market in Asia,
US auto giant General Motors Buick cars being assembled at Wuhan auto plant in Wuhan, China’s Hubei province.
tax expert and partner at Baker &
McKenzie’s Beijing ofﬁce.
Chinese state media has said tax
evasion and avoidance by foreign
companies costs the world’s second
largest economy at least 30bn yuan
($4.8bn) in tax revenues each year.
Larry Sussman, managing partner at O’Melveny & Myers’ Beijing
ofﬁce, said the scope of the scrutiny could also reach private equity
ﬁrms and M&A activity.
“Anything cross-border coming
having already broken into India
with SAIC, where they cooperate
to market Wuling’s small multipurpose workhorse vans.
The move points to a thaw in
what industry watchers considered a creeping chill in the two
companies’ partnership over
recent years.
GM said SAIC-GM-Wuling,
which also includes Wuling
Automobile Co as a stakeholder,
will own 80 percent of the new
Indonesian venture. SAIC will
separately own the rest.
GM owns 44 percent of SAICGM-Wuling, SAIC owns 51.1
percent, and Wuling owns 5.9
percent, so GM’s stake in the
Indonesian venture will effectively
be 35 percent. The venture will
in and coming out, for that matter, which could implicate Chinese
investors,” Sussman said.
Despite the elaboration to the
GAAR rules, they remain loosely
deﬁned, giving tax authorities
discretion on whether companies
meet the demands for economic
substance.
James Zimmerman, Chairman
of the American Chamber of
Commerce in China, said Chamber
members welcomed an upgrade
manufacture and market lowcost “people mover” microvans,
based on the same vehicles that
in China, under the Wuling brand,
can sell for just under 30,000 yuan
(£3,187).
GM already operates a sales
and manufacturing company
in Indonesia with a range of
Chevrolet vehicles that includes
a strategic compact people mover
of its own, the Chevy Spin.
Tsien said GM and SAIC saw
the two brands as complementary,
rather than rivals, as they will be
differentiated by pricing, product
quality and features.
Wuling’s focus is “great functionality, attractive styling and
value for money”, Tsien said.
“That’s the basic element that
to the tax regime, so long as the
policies were consistent with
China’s World Trade Organisation
obligations.
“AmCham-China is hopeful
that the Chinese government will
apply the tax laws and regulations
in a fair, uniform, and transparent
manner, and we will be monitoring
China’s enforcement record going
forward on behalf of our member
companies,” Zimmerman said.
REUTERS
really works here in China, and
we believe under SGMW’s leadership this will be quite successful
in Indonesia as well.”
The GM China chief said
Indonesia had a large and growing appetite for simple multi-purpose vans, often with three rows
of seating that can accommodate
seven or eight people.
He declined to say exactly what
type of microvans they are planning for Indonesia or how they
would market or price them.
Stiff competition will come
from Toyota and other Japanese
brands, which control over 90
percent of the auto market in
Indonesia.
“There is plenty of room to
play,” Tsien said.
REUTERS
McDonald’s to slow
Russia expansion
A McDonald’s sign sits in a scrap yard in Phoenix, Arizona. McDonald’s Corp franchisees have an urgent order for
the fast-food giant’s new CEO Steve Easterbrook — get back-to-basics. Franchisees and advisers to restaurant
owners say they hope the new chief will shrink its huge menu to concentrate on burgers and fries.
MOSCOW: McDonald’s Corp
will open fewer new restaurants in Russia this year than
last because a fall in the rouble has increased expansion
costs and is hurting consumers, its Russian chief executive
Khamzat Khasbulatov said.
The rouble, hit by a drop in oil
prices and Western sanctions over
Ukraine, has fallen more than 50
percent since early 2014, fuelling
inﬂation. Russia now faces its ﬁrst
recession since 2009.
McDonald’s will open at least
50 new restaurants in Russia
compared to 73 last year, having
earmarked 6bn roubles ($87m)
for capital expenditures, the same
amount as in 2014, Khasbulatov
said in an interview. “There is
a major currency component in
new openings. Given the current
conditions of doing business in
Russia ... we are pleased that the
investment resources we have
been allocated remained at last
year’s level,” he said on Saturday.
The US fast-food chain, which
has been operating in Russia for
25 years, was hit by a string of
snap inspections by a state regulator last year, which were widely
seen as retaliation for the West’s
sanctions against Moscow over its
role in the Ukraine crisis.
Those inspections led to temporary closures of 12 restaurants,
including the world’s busiest on
the Pushkin square in Moscow.
Khasbulatov said the company
had taken advantage of some of
the closures to modernize the restaurants. All have reopened but
their sales have yet to catch up
with pre-closure levels.
The unexpected scrutiny had
not led McDonald’s to changing
its attitude towards the market,
Khasbulatov said.
REUTERS
MONDAY 2 FEBRUARY 2015
www.thepeninsulaqatar.com
MARKET
QE Indices Summary
QE Index
12,062.10
QE Total Return Index
17,990.51
1.37 %
QE Al Rayan Islamic Index
4,116.38
1.93 %
QE All Share Index
3,100.2
1.24 %
QE All Share Banks & Financial
Services
3,150.26
1.04 %
QE All Share Industrials
3,879.64
1.94 %
QE All Share Transportation
2,354.23
0.77 %
QE All Share Real Estate
2,284.93
1.58 %
QE All Share Insurance
3,885.93
0.61 %
QE All Share Telecoms
1,379.14
0.56 %
QE All Share Consumer Goods &
Services
7,164.67
0.45 %
QE Market Summary Comparison
Index
Change
%
YTD%
Volume
Value (QAR)
Trades
Today
Previous day
01-02-2015
29-01-2015
12,062.10
162.47
1.37
1.82
10,195,113
417,453,715.91
5,079
11,899.63
81.03
0.68
3.14
8,482,646
374,501,187.55
4,815
Up 32 | Down 04 | Unchanged 03
WORLD STOCK INDICES
1.37 %
INDEX
All Ordinaries
Day’s Close
5516.557
Pt Chg
5.092
% Chg
Year High
Year Low
0.09
5511.5
5248.5
Cac 40 Index/D
4608.05
-16.16
-0.35
4679.26
4076.16
Dj Indu Average
17387.21
-291.49
-1.65
18103.4
15340.69
Hang Seng Inde/D
24861.81
54.53
0.22
24995.08
23312.5
Iseq Overall/D
5498.24
-43.37
-0.78
5639.89
5072.7
Karachi 100 In/D
34386.86
-151.59
-0.44
34626.87
32134.82
Nikkei 225 Index
17795.73
27.43
0.15
17768.41
16592.57
S&P 500 Index/D
2029.55
-27.54
-1.34
2093.55
1737.92
Straits Times/D
3419.15
6.95
0.2
3428.49
3267.89
Straits Times/D
3290.99
-1.82
-0.06
3387.84
2953.01
Straits Times/D
3274.06
-8.82
-0.27
3291.83
2953.01
GOLD & SILVER
GOLD
QR151.4574
SILVER
QR 2.1172
25
EXCHANGE
RATE
Buying Selling
CRUDE OIL
BRENT
$ 48.95
DUBAI
$ 44.94
US$.......................... QR 3.6305
UK ........................... QR 5.5013
Euro ......................... QR 4.1152
CA$.......................... QR 2.9036
Swiss Fr .................. QR 4.0169
Yen .......................... QR 0.0306
Aus$ ........................ QR 2.8681
Ind Re ...................... QR 0.0588
Pak Re ..................... QR 0.0358
Peso ........................ QR 0.0818
SL Re....................... QR 0.0273
Taka ......................... QR 0.0463
Nep Re .................... QR 0.0369
SA Rand .................. QR 0.3123
QR 3.6500
QR 5.5780
QR 4.1724
QR 2.9603
QR 4.0737
QR 0.0311
QR 2.9260
QR 0.0599
QR 0.0365
QR 0.0834
QR 0.0279
QR 0.0473
QR 0.0376
QR 0.3186
QATAR EXCHANGE | DAILY TRADING REPORT | 01-02-2015
Islamic ﬁnance looks to outgrow bad habits as it expands
BY BERNARDO VIZCAINO
fter a year of landmark
deals which are opening
new markets for Islamic
ﬁnance, the industry is
under fresh pressure to address
some of its shortcomings and
prove that it is not just an imitation of conventional ﬁnance.
Born in its modern form during the 1970s, Islamic ﬁnance
has boomed in the last few years
on the back of strong economic
growth in its core markets, the
Gulf and southeast Asia.
Over the past 12 months it has
shown signs of going global, as
even non-Muslim countries have
promoted it in the hope of luring
cash-rich Islamic funds. Britain,
Hong Kong and South Africa
issued debut sovereign Islamic
bonds; the industry’s worldwide
assets are now estimated to total
over $2 trillion. But with this
success have come doubts over
whether Islamic ﬁnance is living
up to all of its principles. After
all, it was launched not merely
to make money, but to promote
Muslim values such as equity,
A
risk-sharing and social inclusion.
Those values may sometimes
be getting lost as ﬁnancial institutions engineer products which
obey the letter of Islamic law — for
example, a ban on interest payments — while mimicking conventional ﬁnance in many ways.
Top industry bodies such as the
Jeddah-based Islamic Deveopment
Bank, a multilateral lending institution with 56 member countries,
are leading calls for Islamic banks
to strengthen their moral foundations and promote real economic
activity instead of monetary
speculation. This will require the
sector to go back to the drawing
board and develop genuine Islamic
ﬁnance products that are not only
proﬁtable but support socioeconomic development, IDB president Ahmad Mohamed Ali said in
a speech in Jakarta in November.
“The potential of Islamic ﬁnance
is not fully realised and in practice
most ﬁnancing is concentrated on
a few modes.”
A survey by consultancy PWC,
published last October, found only
52 percent of Islamic banking customers in the Gulf region believed
their bank lived up to their religious values.
Ashruff Jamal, PWC’s global
Islamic ﬁnancial services leader,
said Islamic banks were “at a
crossroads” as growth was slowing
and to maintain expansion, they
would need to convince increasingly sophisticated customers that
they were different from conventional banks.
One area of controversy is the
structures which Islamic banks
used for funding. In Asia and parts
of the Gulf, for example, murabaha
— a cost-plus-proﬁt deal where
one party buys merchandise for
another — is popular. But scholars
criticise it for its resemblance to a
conventional loan, with the pricing
of a murabaha contract effectively
acting as an interest payment.
Structures with stronger riskand proﬁt-sharing elements such
as musharaka, a partnership in
which two or more parties agree
to provide capital, are rarer.
In some jurisdictions, regulators
are moving to change this, but it
remains to be seen whether they
can shift entrenched behaviour
among the banks. In Pakistan,
central bank governor Ashraf
Wathra warned Islamic banks last
week to develop ways to reward
their customers in line with a rise
in the sector’s proﬁtability, or face
unspeciﬁed regulatory action.
In Malaysia, the government
plans to roll out an investment
platform this year to spur wider
use of risk-sharing and equitybased contracts by Islamic banks.
The result of such initiatives
could be to push Islamic banks
beyond their longstanding role as
credit providers to become investment intermediaries — a shift
that would bring them closer to
the spirit of Islamic ﬁnance, some
analysts feel. “Banks will become
more of a full-service, asset manager-type of organisation versus
just banking services,” said Khalid
Howladar, Moody’s global head of
Islamic ﬁnance.
Also controversial are the
“Islamic windows” of banks and
insurers, which let them operate conventional and Shariahcompliant businesses side by side.
Funding of the two sides is supposed to be completely separate,
but the arrangement can lead to
doubts. Although Islamic windows are common, they can make
it hard for Islamic institutions to
distinguish themselves from conventional ones in the eyes of consumers, PWC’s Jamal said.
There are signs of a gradual regulatory backlash against the practice. Qatar banned it in 2011, and
when Oman introduced Islamic
banking rules in 2012, it required
Islamic windows to operate out
of physically separate branches.
In Indonesia, a new law requires
insurers to spin off their Islamic
windows by 2024.
It may be harder, though, to
ensure Islamic ﬁnance lives up to
the principle that it should promote social welfare by giving needy
people better access to funds.
Tens of millions of people in the
Muslim world lack bank accounts
because of poverty, poor education and lack of infrastructure. In
theory, Islamic banks could help
to change this by attracting customers who are not served by conventional banks. But outside a few
areas, such as rural Afghanistan,
there is little evidence of them
doing this on a large scale.
“At the moment this has been
neglected, so there is a void — this
is not in line with Islamic teaching,” said Abdul Halim Ismail, who
in 1983 founded Malaysia’s Bank
Islam, the country’s ﬁrst fullﬂedged Islamic lender.
Ismail is prompting the idea of
an institution that would channel charitable funds into projects
to help the poor and needy, with
such investments managed by
Islamic banks to burnish their
social credentials. But few Islamic
banks — perhaps inevitably, given
pressure from shareholders and
ﬁnancial markets — are embracing
the social dimension and making
substantial efforts to offer products such as Shariah-compliant
microﬁnance.
Excluding some efforts in
Indonesia and Pakistan, “I fear
there is not much to tell regarding an attempt by bigger Islamic
ﬁnance institutions to become
active in microﬁnance,” said
Matthias Range, adviser at the
German government’s international development agency GIZ,
which supports such efforts.
REUTERS
MONDAY 2 FEBRUARY 2015
www.thepeninsulaqatar.com
26
SPORT
Maxwell leads Aussies
to Tri Series triumph
All-rounder ﬁres 95 and grabs 4 wickets in big win
PERTH: A stellar performance with bat and ball by allrounder Glenn Maxwell helped
Australia to a crushing victory
over England in the One Day
International Tri Series ﬁnal
yesterday.
Maxwell top-scored with 95,
helping Australia recover from a
poor start at the WACA ground
to end on 278 for eight.
He then took four wickets and
a ﬁne catch as England crumbled
in the run chase to be dismissed
for just 166 in 39.1 overs.
England, who will face Australia
in the World Cup opener later
this month, were never in the
hunt after returning paceman
Mitchell Johnson (3-27) claimed
three quick wickets to have them
46 for four.
He was on a hat-trick after
removing Moeen Ali for 26 and
then England skipper Eoin
Morgan, who was bowled without
offering a shot.
Maxwell (4-46) also found himself on a hat-trick after removing
Jos Buttler (17) and the hapless
Chris Woakes (0), who had a
match to forget, with successive
deliveries.
Morgan conceded his team
had a “poor day”, but denied
suggestions that Johnson – who
destroyed England in the Ashes
whitewash last winter – had reopened old wounds.
Maxwell praised a dominant
performance by his team and was
delighted to prove his worth.
“Both aspects of my game were
pretty good today, ﬁnally,” he said.
“I knew I had that in me. I just
hadn’t shown it yet.”
After being put in to bat the
home side slumped for 60 for four
against some good early bowling
from James Anderson.
But a 141-run partnership
between Maxwell and local
favourite Mitchell Marsh turned
the match.
Maxwell was a marginal selection in Australia’s World Cup
squad after his indifferent form
over the past 12 months. But he
showed his worth with a typically
inventive innings that combined
bewildering and brilliant strokes.
He and Marsh set a new WACA
record for a ﬁfth-wicket stand
in a One Day International, and
Maxwell looked set for his ﬁrst
ODI hundred as he passed his
previous best score of 93.
However, another audacious
stroke brought about his demise
for 95, caught behind by Buttler
Scoreboard
AUSTRALIA
A Finch c Root b Anderson ........................... 0
D Warner c Taylor b Anderson .................... 12
S Smith st Buttler b Ali............................... 40
G Bailey c Taylor b Broad ............................. 2
G Maxwell c Buttler b Broad....................... 95
M Marsh (run out-Anderson, Buttler) .......... 60
B Haddin c Taylor b Broad............................ 9
J Faulkner (not out) ................................... 50
M Johnson c Morgan b Finn ........................ 3
M Starc (not out) ......................................... 0
Extras (B-1, LB-3, W-3) ............................... 7
Total (for 8 wkts in 50 overs)............... 278
Fall of wickets: 1-0, 2-33, 3-46, 4-60, 5-201,
6-217, 7-224, 8-269.
Bowling: J Anderson 10-2-38-2; C Woakes
10-0-89-0(w-1); S Broad 10-1-55-3(w-1); S
Finn 10-0-53-1(w-1); M Ali 10-0-39-1.
ENGLAND
M Ali c Finch b Johnson ............................ 26
Mayweather
dampens
hopes for
Pacquiao ﬁght
LAS VEGAS: Unbeaten ﬁghter
Floyd Mayweather dampened
talk of a possible mega-ﬁght
agreement with Filipino boxer
Manny Pacquiao on Saturday, a
day after the Asian star’s promoter said a deal was near.
Mayweather posted a message
on his Shots account that said
in part “While they continue to
lie about making the ﬁght... I’m
just going to continue to travel
and explore the world on my
private jet. #FightNotMadeYet
#Jamaica.”
Pacquiao promoter Bob Arum
told the New York Post on Friday
that he was optimistic a PacquiaoMayweather deal for a May 2
ﬁght in Las Vegas would be completed in the next couple of days,
with only a few ﬁnal details to be
settled between rival telecasters HBO and Showtime, the
rights holders for Pacquiao and
Mayweather respectively.
Mayweather, who turns 38
on February 24, left England’s
Amir Khan hanging for months
until announcing on his birthday last year that he would ﬁght
Argentina’s Marcos Maidana
instead. Mayweather wound up
beating the South American twice
in 2014, but has yet to test himself
against Pacquiao or Khan.Filipino
southpaw Pacquiao is 57-5 with
two drawn and 38 knockouts
while Mayweather is 47-0 with
26 knockouts. Fans have sought
a showdown between the two for
ﬁve years, thus far in vain. AFP
I Bell c Haddin b Hazlewood ......................... 8
J Taylor c Maxwell b Johnson ....................... 4
J Root lbw Faulkner ................................... 25
E Morgan b Johnson ................................... 0
R Bopara c Bailey b Maxwell ...................... 33
J Buttler c (sub) b Maxwell ......................... 17
C Woakes c&b Maxwell ............................... 0
S Broad c (sub) b Maxwell ......................... 24
S Finn b Hazlewood..................................... 6
J Anderson (not out) .................................... 5
Extras (LB-8, W-10) .................................. 18
Total (all ou in 39.1 overs) ................... 166
Fall of wickets: 1-18, 2-35, 3-46, 4-46, 5-71,
6-98, 7-98, 8-130, 9-160, 10-166.
Bowling: M Starc 7-0-40-0(w-3); J Hazlewood 6.1-2-13-2; M Johnson 7-2-27-3(w-1);
M Marsh 7-0-18-0(w-2); G Maxwell 9-0-464(w-4); J Faulkner 2.3-1-11-1; A Finch 0.3-03-0.
Result: Australia won by 112 runs.
Inﬁniti Red Bull Racing’s Australian driver Daniel Ricciardo drives on the
ﬁrst day of the Formula One pre-season tests in Jerez, yesterday.
Red Bull launch new car
in pursuit of Mercedes
Australia’s
Glenn
Maxwell
reverse
pulls for
four against
England
during their
Tri Series
ﬁnal at
the WACA
Ground
in Perth,
yesterday.
after top-edging an attempted
pull shot off Stuart Broad (3-55).
Maxwell hit 15 fours off 98 balls.
Marsh offered great support,
displaying his powerful strokeplay
in making 60 from 68 balls, with
seven fours and one six, before
being run out.
The pair came together when
Australia were in trouble after
the loss of Steve Smith for 40,
stumped at the second attempt
by Buttler off the bowling of Ali.
Anderson (2-38) had earlier made two precious early
breakthroughs, removing openers Aaron Finch (0) and Dave
Warner (12). Stand-in skipper
George Bailey’s dry run with the
bat continued when he made just
two from 17 balls before being dismissed. With much attention on
whether regular captain Michael
Clarke will be ﬁt for the World
Cup, Bailey faces a battle to retain
his spot in Australia’s 11, with
just 235 runs at 16.78 in his last
14 innings.
Australia’s total was boosted by
a lusty unbeaten 50 – off just 24
balls and including four sixes –
by James Faulkner in the dying
overs.
The right-hander took 22 runs
off the last four balls of the 49th
over by Chris Woakes, who went
wicketless and conceded 89 runs
from his 10 overs.
Faulkner then pulled Steven
Finn into the crowd at square leg
to bring up his half-century from
the last ball of the innings.
However, Faulkner was forced
from the ﬁeld during his third
over in the England innings, after
an apparent side injury.
AFP
Ricciardo this season. “It’s an
exciting and dynamic line-up,”
added Horner.
“We know the quality of Daniel
following his performances last
year and in Daniil we have an
outstanding talent. The speed,
commitment and determination
he demonstrated were all the
qualities we’re looking for.
“They’re young, hungry, they’re
incredibly quick and I think they
are going to push each other very
hard throughout the year.”
Ricciardo was given the honour
of driving the new car yesterdayand is determined to not rest on
his laurels after a breakthrough
year.
“I’m looking forward to driving
the RB11 and I’m hanging out to
get behind the wheel again. I hope
it’s going to be a beast,” he said.
“There was plenty of pressure
on me last year to prove myself in
a top team and I think everyone
knows now what I’m capable of
so I’m excited to build on what
we achieved in 2014 and ready to
give Mercedes a good ﬁght.”
Kyvat has just one full season of
F1 racing under his belt, ﬁnishing
15th in the drivers’ standings with
Toro Rosso in 2014.
And, whilst he recognised the
demands will be much higher at
Red Bull, he refused to set any
tangibile targets for the new
campaign.
“It’s a fantastic opportunity for
me and I’m really looking forward
to ﬁnally getting into the car. It’s
going to be cool.
“Though many people in the
team know me quite well, there
is still the challenge of entering a
new team for myself.”
AFP
NHL: Senators trounce
Coyotes for full points
Cleveland
Cavaliers’ forward
Kevin Love (left)
celebrates with
forward LeBron
James during the
fourth quarter
of their NBA
game against
the Minnesota
Timberwolves at
Target Center.
NBA: James stars as Cavaliers
earn win, Clippers beat Spurs
NEW YORK: On a night
widely hyped as Kevin Love’s
ﬁrst game back in Minnesota
since being traded to Cleveland,
LeBron James scored 36 points
to propel the Cavaliers to their
10th straight victory.
James put up 13 consecutive
points in the fourth quarter as
the Cavaliers (29-20) fended
off a spirited surge from the
Timberwolves, owners of the
NBA’s worst record (8-39).
Clippers 105, Spurs 85
Forward Blake Grifﬁn scored 31
points as the Los Angeles Clippers
defeated the San Antonio Spurs
at the AT&T Centre.
Grifﬁn shot 12-of-21 and also
tallied 13 rebounds and ﬁve assists
for the Clippers in their second
game in as many nights. Los
JEREZ DE LA FRONTERA,
Spain: Red Bull team principal Christian Horner wants to
give Mercedes more of a run
for their money in 2015 after
launching the new RB11 on the
season’s ﬁrst day of testing in
Jerez on Sunday.
Sporting an unusual camouﬂage livery, the Red Bull completed more laps in the ﬁrst hour
on track than they managed on
the ﬁrst day of a disastrous ﬁrst
test last season.
That was a sign of things to
come for the four-time constructors’ champions as despite ﬁnishing second they were nearly
300 points behind Mercedes, for
whom Lewis Hamilton sealed his
second world championship.
“Our target is simple: to close
down the gap to Mercedes yet
further,” said Horner.
“We were the only team other
than Mercedes to win a Grand
Prix in 2014 and we won three
with Daniel Ricciardo. Our target
is to close the gap down and put
Mercedes under as much pressure
as we possibly can.
“We know what we’re aiming at, we know what we need to
achieve and I believe that with the
RB11, with the drivers we have
and with the new structures put
in place we should be able to do
that.”
Ricciardo’s debut season with
the team was the bright spark
in 2014 as he beat out four-time
world champion team-mate
Sebastian Vettel to ﬁnish third
in the drivers’ standings.
With Vettel having moved on
to Ferrari, 20-year-old Russian
Daniil Kyvat will partner
NBA Results
Sacramento
Dallas
Toronto
Atlanta
Detroit
Memphis
Cleveland
Milwaukee
Charlotte
LA Clippers
Golden State
99
108
120
91
114
85
106
95
104
105
106
Indiana
94
Orlando
93
Washington
116
Philadelphia
85
Houston
101
Oklahoma City 74
Minnesota
90
Portland
88
Denver
86
San Antonio
85
Phoenix
87
Angeles guard Chris Paul added
20 points, while reserve center
Spencer Hawes contributed 11 in
the match.
Grizzlies 85, Thunder 74
Zach Randolph posted his
NBA-leading 12th straight
double-double (21 points and
18 rebounds) to help Memphis
extend its winning streak to six
games.
Centre Marc Gasol also had a
double-double with 15 points and
12 rebounds, plus ﬁve assists.
Raptors 120, Wizards 116
(OT)
The Raptors blew a 21-point
second-half lead, but ultimately
matched their season-high sixgame winning streak with the
overtime win.
Kyle Lowry scored 23 points
and fellow guard Lou Williams
had 19 for the Raptors (33-15).
Toronto opened the game by sinking 10 of 12 three-pointers, then
took control during a 19-3 run in
second quarter and never trailed
during regulation. AGENCIES
NEW YORK: The Senators
scored a 7-2 win in the ﬁrst NHL
game in more than 30 years featuring two sets of brothers, as
Ottawa wingers Mark Stone
and Milan Michalek faced off
against a Coyotes team that
included defenceman Michael
Stone and Zbynek Michalek.
Three of the four factored in
the scoring, as second-period
goals by Milan Michalek and
Mark Stone broke a 1-1 tie and
put the Senators ahead to stay in
the match.
The last time two sets of
brothers shared the same ice
surface was December 23, 1983,
when Wayne Babych and Joe
Mullen (St. Louis) played against
Dave Babych and Brian Mullen
(Winnipeg).
Lightning 3, Blue Jackets 1
Goaltender Ben Bishop had
34 saves to lift Tampa Bay over
Columbus.
Right winger Brett Connolly
scored his ninth goal of the season
Paul Byron (left)
of the Calgary
Flames carries
the puck against
Justin Schultz of
the Edmonton
Oilers during
an NHL game
at Scotiabank
Saddledome
yesterday in
Calgary, Alberta,
Canada.
and centers Cedric Paquette and
Valtteri Filppula had third-period
goals as the Lightning set a franchise record with their 10th consecutive win at home.
Tampa Bay remain on top of
the Eastern Conference standings
with 68 points, one point ahead
of the Detroit Red Wings and
Montreal Canadiens.
Rangers 4, Hurricanes 1
Left winger Rick Nash scored
his 29th goal of the season as the
New York Rangers snapped a
two-game slide.
AGENCIES
NHL Results
Montreal
Detroit
Ottawa
Boston
New Jersey
NY Rangers
Philadelphia
Dallas
Tampa Bay
1
4
7
3
3
4
1
5
3
Washington
NY Islanders
Arizona
Los Angeles
Florida
Carolina
Toronto
Winnipeg
Columbus
0
1
2
1
1
1
0
2
1
MONDAY 2 FEBRUARY 2015
www.thepeninsulaqatar.com
SPORT
27
H H The Emir Sword Endurance Ride
The winners and ofﬁcials of the H H The Emir Sword Endurance Ride with H E Sheikh Thani bin Hamad Al Thani in Doha yesterday. Altogether 38 riders participated in the event and 10 were able to ﬁnish it. Khalifa Ali Khalifa Al
Attiya stood ﬁrst while Ehab Naji Kamal Hussein was second and Faleh Nasser Saleh Bughenaim was third. Adulla Mahmood Abdulla Darban came fourth, Saleh Salem Ali Al Marri was ﬁfth, Abdulrahman Saad Al Sulaiteen was
sixth, Hamad Abdulla Al Jumaily was seventh and Hamad Saad Saleh Al Nabit was eighth.
Al Attiyah leads strong
ﬁeld at MERC opener
QMMF Qatar International Rally kicks off this weekend
DOHA: Defending FIA Middle
East Rally Champion and recent
Dakar Rally winner Nasser
Saleh Al Attiyah will lock
horns with Abu Dhabi Racing’s
Sheikh Khalid Al Qassimi and
Saudi Arabia’s Yazeed Al Rajhi
this week at the QMMF Qatar
International Rally, which kicks
off the 2015 FIA Middle East
Rally Championship (MERC).
The Qatar Motor and
Motorcycle Federation (QMMF)
released the entry list for the
three-day event which will be
held this weekend and the trio
top a high-quality ﬁeld of competitors from Qatar, the UAE,
Saudi Arabia, Oman, Germany,
Kuwait, Great Britain, Ireland,
Greece, France and Iran.
Al Attiyah will be partnered
by Frenchman Matthieu Baumel,
with whom he won the recent
Dakar Rally. Baumel replaces
Italian Giovanni Bernacchini,
who worked alongside Al Attiyah
for several years in special stage
rallies.
Ford Fiestas dominate the
upper reaches of the entry list
with the exception of a solitary Citroen DS3 RRC for the
UAE’s Al Qassimi. Al Attiyah,
Al Rajhi and the Qatari quartet
of Abdulaziz and Abdullah Al
Kuwari and Khalifa Al Attiyah
and Khalid Al Sowaidi have all
been entered in British-built Ford
Fiestas.
The remaining ﬁeld will drive
a selection of Mitsubishi Lancer
Evolutions, with the Kuwaiti duo
of Saleh bin Eidan and Meshari
Al Thaﬁri heading the group.
A two-car Tehran Rally Team
has entered the Qatar event
for the ﬁrst time on the back
of the new Iran Rally joining
Qatar’s Nasser Saleh Al Attiyah gives a thumbs-up. Al Attiyah will face tough competition from Abu Dhabi
Racing’s Sheikh Khalid Al Qassimi and Saudi Arabia’s Yazeed Al Rajhi.
the regional rally championship
for the ﬁrst time in May this
year. Laleh Seddigh and Elaheh
Karim crew one of the cars and
Ali Mesgarha and Yahidreza
Vahdatinkzad occupy the second
entry.
The Sultanate of Oman has also
returned to the MERC calendar
in 2015 after a seven-year absence
and two Omani drivers will grace
the entry list in Qatar for the ﬁrst
time in several years.
The experienced Khalid
Soomar Al Zadjali teams up with
Taha Soomar Al Zadjali in a
Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution VII
and Khalid Saleh Al Minji and
Saif Al Aisri crew a second car.
German female driver Edith
Weiss will be taking part in
her eighth Qatar International
Rally, this time at the wheel of a
Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution IX
alongside her Greek navigator
Vicky Psaraki. Weiss ﬁnished 12th
overall, second in Group N and
ﬁrst of the ladies’ crews last year.
“Qatar has one of the most
demanding gravel-surface rallies
in the world and I always look forward to coming here to compete,”
said Weiss, who ﬁrst competed in
Qatar in 1992.
“The event is professionally
organised by the QMMF and it’s
always a pleasure to be here,” she
added.
The three days of desert rallying will also play host to the
Qatar Misfer National Rally
Championship, held in memory of
the late Misfer Al Marri. Round
one will take place over Thursday
and Friday and the second round
will be fought out over Saturday’s
timed tests.
Crews begin their reconnaissance of the special stages today
and the special stage action gets
underway with a short street
stage after the ceremonial start
at Doha’s Corniche on Thursday
evening.
THE PENINSULA
Rosberg psyched for
Hamilton ‘rematch’
JEREZ DE LA FRONTERA,
Spain: Nico Rosberg says he is
ready to take the ﬁght for the
Formula One driver’s title to
team-mate and world champion
Lewis Hamilton once more in
2015.
Hamilton saw off Rosberg to
claim his second world title last
season as Mercedes dominated,
winning all but three of the 19
races.
The German giants launched
their new W06 car on the ﬁrst
day of testing in Jerez on Sunday,
but continued to look dominant
on the track as Rosberg went
fastest and racked up over 50 laps
in the morning session.
“I know the feeling of winning
and of ﬁghting for a championship
after last year, but I also know the
feeling of not winning in the end
and I don’t want to repeat that,”
said the German.
“It’s an extra boost and it gives
me so much motivation for the
year ahead.”
Rosberg and Hamilton endured
a frosty relationship last season
with Mercedes team chief Toto
Wolff at one point describing their
battle as “two enemies competing
for the world title”.
Mercedes are expected to come
under more of a challenge this
season with relatively few technical rule changes from last year.
Former world champions
Fernando Alonso and Sebastian
Vettel have moved to McLaren
and Ferrari respectively in the
hope of boosting their title credentials. However, it is Hamilton
that Rosberg has in his sights for
the coming season.
“We know the opposition will
be right there, so we have to
keep pushing ﬂat out to have any
chance of doing that.
“Nothing is for certain but,
whatever happens, I know it
will be another great battle with
Lewis. This year is the rematch
for me and I’m massively motivated for it.”
Hamilton won 11 races to
Rosberg’s ﬁve in 2014 and is
determined not to rest on his laurels with his future at Mercedes
still unclear.
The Englishman is out of contract at the end of the season with
negotiations ongoing over a lucrative new deal.
“You hear about people who
achieve a lot but then lose their
focus and you wonder; at what
point does it fade off? I’m grateful that the ﬁre is still there in
me,” Hamilton said.
“I love winning races but it just
feels so much better when you
have to ﬁght for it. I just want to
get back out there, race hard, be
the best I can be and hopefully
win some more,” the Englishman
said.
AFP
German Formula One driver Nico Rosberg (left) and Britain’s Lewis
Hamilton pose for a selﬁe during the presentation of the new Mercedes
W06 Formula One car at the Jerez racetrack in Spain yesterday.
McIlroy hits record-equalling score to win Dubai title again
Rory McIlroy of Northern Ireland poses with the winner’s trophy of the
Dubai Desert Classic golf tournament in Dubai yesterday.
DUBAI: World number one
Rory McIlroy coasted home to
capture a second Dubai Desert
Classic title yesterday, winning
by three shots and ﬁnishing on
a tournament record equalling
22-under-par.
The four-time major winner
shot a ﬁnal round 70 to claim his
10th European Tour success.
Sweden’s Alex Noren shot a
ﬁnal round 65 to ﬁnish second
on 19-under-par and three clear
of double defending champion
Stephen Gallacher of Scotland,
who posted a 69 for a 16-underpar total.
McIlroy’s victory ended a run
of three straight second place ﬁnishes, stretching back to last year.
“It’s been a fantastic week for
everyone who played here this
week and it’s just nice to get my
name on that trophy again,” said
McIlroy.
“So I am very delighted because
I was feeling like I was playing for
second every time I was teeing it
Dubai Desert Classic Final Scores
Leading ﬁnal-round scores in the $2.5m Dubai Desert Classic yesterday at the par-72 Majlis course of Emirates Golf Club:
266 Rory McIlroy (NIR) 66-64-66-70
269 Alex Noren (SWE) 68-67-69-65
272 Stephen Gallacher (SCO) 66-67-70-69
273 Martin Kaymer (GER) 67-69-73-64, Gary Stal (FRA) 69-69-67-68, Andy Sulliavan (ENG) 65-6870-70, Bernd Wiesberger (AUT) 64-69-70-70, Morten Orum Madsen (DEN) 71-63-66-73
274 Thomas Aiken (RSA) 68-71-66-69, Graeme McDowell (NIR) 67-65-72-70, Robert Rock (ENG)
68-67-69-70, Lee Westwood (ENG) 65-68-69-72
275 Gregory Bourdy (FRA) 69-71-69-66, Henrik Stenson (SWE) 70-66-70-69, Byeong-hun An
(KOR) 70-70-66-69, Renato Paratore (ITA) 68-66-70-71, Peter Uihlein (USA) 65-69-70-71,
Marc Warren (SCO) 66-65-73-71, Danny Willett (ENG) 67-66-70-72
276 Alvaro Quiros (ESP) 73-69-70-64, Ross Fisher (ENG) 71-68-71-66, Gregory Havret (FRA)
68-71-70-67, Pablo Larrazabal (ESP) 69-66-69-72, Emiliano Grillo (ARG) 67-68-69-72
277 David Howell (ENG) 71-69-69-68, Richard Green (AUS) 70-68-70-69
278 Raphael Jacquelin (FRA) 71-71-67-69, David Lipsky (USA) 68-71-68-71
up, so it was time for a change and
the only way I wanted to go was
one better and thankfully I was
able to do that today.”
McIlroy went into the last
round of his second event of the
year leading by four shots at
20-under-par, but it was a slow
start for the 25-year-old, who was
level par after nine holes with a
third hole birdie and a bogey at
seven.
McIlroy then went ﬁve clear of
his rivals with a birdie at 10 and
another on 13.
He then ended with ﬁve
straight pars and missed a 20-foot
birdie putt at the last that would
have seen him card a 23-underpar tournament record.
Despite the apparent ease of
his victory, McIlroy said he still
gets nervous and was also conscious of recent European Tour
collapses from Charl Schwartzel
at the South African Open and
US Open winner Martin Kaymer
in Abu Dhabi.
“I do still get nervous and felt I
was a little tentative the ﬁrst few
holes out there because I guess
we have seen what can happen to
big leads over the past few weeks
with Martin and Charl, so I was
conscious of that,” he said.
“So I was trying hard not to
make any mistakes and happy I
was able to play a solid round.
“But the thing I do is that I set
myself a target that tries to take
everyone else out of it... While I
didn’t quite get to the number I
set myself I was still able to do
enough.”
REUTERS
28
MONDAY 2 FEBRUARY 2015
www.thepeninsulaqatar.com
SPORT
Djokovic beats Murray for
ﬁfth Australian Open title
World number one bags eighth Grand Slam title with four-set win
MELBOURNE: World number
one Novak Djokovic won a ﬁfth
Australian Open title and his
eighth Grand Slam yesterday,
grinding down Andy Murray in
four gruelling sets to heap more
misery on the luckless Scot.
The Serb won 7-6 (7/5), 6-7
(4/7), 6-3, 6-0 in 3hr 39min to
stretch his formidable record on
the Melbourne hardcourts to winning ﬁve from ﬁve ﬁnals in eight
years.
Only Australian Roy Emerson,
who presented him with the trophy, has won more Australian
Opens with six in the 1960s.
“I am so privileged and honoured and grateful to be standing
here as a champion for the ﬁfth
time and to be in the elite group
of players with Sir Roy Emerson
and Rod Laver and all the legends
of our sport,” he said.
“It’s an honour playing in front
of you, thank you very much.”
Djokovic has now beaten
Murray in three of his four
Australian ﬁnal losses following
earlier wins in 2011 and 2013,
although the Scot mastered
him in his two major triumphs
at the 2012 US Open and 2013
Wimbledon.
The victory means Djokovic
stays at world number one on the
next ATP rankings when they are
released today, with Murray moving to four from his current sixth.
“I had opportunities in the ﬁrst
three sets. Then the fourth set,
he was just ripping everything,”
said Murray, dejection etched on
his face.
“The returns he was hitting on
the baseline.
“Once he got up a break, he just
loosened up and was just going
for his shots. I couldn’t recover,”
Murray said.
Murray put Djokovic under
immediate pressure with three
break points in the third game of
the opening set, played in cool and
windy conditions on Rod Laver
Arena.
But the Serb fought back to
hold after an almighty 27-stroke
rally and an ace.
Djokovic struck in the next
game, breaking Murray to take
an early 3-1 lead.
It was hard-fought tennis and
the Scot worked his way back by
breaking his rival on his third
break point in the seventh game.
Djokovic jammed the thumb of
his serving hand when he slipped
chasing a low volley and needed
treatment at the next changeover.
Serbia’s Novak
Djokovic holds The
Norman Brookes
Trophy as he walks on
court after victory in
the singles ﬁnal match
against Britain’s Andy
Murray in Melbourne
yesterday.
Veterans Hingis-Paes
win mixed doubles title
MELBOURNE:
Comeback
queen Martina Hingis rolled
back the years to claim her ﬁrst
Grand Slam title since 2006 on
Sunday, clinching the Australian
Open mixed doubles crown with
fellow veteran Leander Paes.
The old stagers, seeded seven,
were in their ﬁrst major outing as a pairing and drew on all
their experience to down the
third seeds, France’s Kristina
Mladenovic and Canadian Daniel
Nestor 6-4, 6-3.
Hingis’ win comes 20 years
after making her Melbourne
debut as a 14-year-old and less
than a year after coming out of
retirement.
“Not even in my wildest dreams
would I have believed that 20
years later I’d be standing here
again,” said the Swiss star, who
spent 209 weeks as the world’s
number one singles player in her
heyday.
“It’s not even like the cherry
on top, it’s more than that to
be there and to be able to hold
another trophy with Leander. It’s
more than I could ever dream of.”
Hingis, the holder of ﬁve Grand
Slam singles titles, now has 11
major doubles crowns -- nine
women’s and two mixed. Her last
Martina Hingis of Switzerland with Leander Paes of India speak to the
media after winning their mixed doubles ﬁnal match on the ﬁnal day of
the Australian Open at Melbourne Park, Melbourne, yesterday.
major success was in the mixed
doubles at Melbourne Park with
another Indian, Mahesh Bhupathi,
in 2006. Paes, 41, has won eight
men’s doubles and seven mixed
doubles Grand Slams and said
he planned to aim for more, with
retirement not on his mind.
“My dad, as soon as we won I
called him, he goes, ‘Okay, now
you have to focus on the next
one’. I said, ‘Dad, it hasn’t even
been ﬁve minutes’. But I love the
game of tennis. To play with this
champion who I keep learning
from every day is a lot of fun. I
look forward to being back soon.”
Hingis, 34, came out of six
years’ retirement last year, partnering Italy’s Flavia Pennetta to
make the US Open women’s doubles ﬁnal.
RUETERS
Novak Djokovic of Serbia holds up his trophy next to runner-up Andy
Murray of Britain after winning their singles ﬁnal match at the Australian
Open in Melbourne yesterday.
Australian Open Results
MELBOURNE: Results from day 14 of the Australian Open at
Melbourne Park yesterday:
Men’s singles Final: Novak Djokovic (SRB x1) bt Andy Murray
(GBR x6) 7-6 (7/5), 6-7 (4/7), 6-3, 6-0.
Mixed doubles Final: Martina Hingis (SUI)/Leander Paes (IND
x7) bt Kristina Mladenovic (FRA)/Daniel Nestor (CAN x3) 6-4, 6-3.
It seemed to bother him brieﬂy
only and he broke the Scot a second time before being broken
back as he served for the opening set, taking it to a tiebreaker.
The top seed trailed 2-4 in the
tiebreaker but then rattled off ﬁve
of the next six points to claim the
opening set in 72 minutes.
Undeterred, Murray broke for
a 2-0 lead in the second set before
Djokovic hit back with a double
break.
The ﬁnal was then interrupted
by a security scare for ﬁve minutes when political activists
unfurled a banner in support of
refugees.
One of them jumped on court
with security guards ringing both
players as at least four protestors
were escorted out of the stadium.
The stoppage worked in
Murray’s favour as he broke
Djokovic’s service to level the set
at 4-4. It went to a second tiebreak in which Murray prevailed
7-4 to level the contest.
Djokovic admitted the protest
distracted him.
“The interruption on the court
happened and I lost my concentration and Andy started coming
into the match and two and half
hours and two sets it took a toll
of our bodies,” he said. “I didn’t
want to show him that I was
going through some tough physical moments.”
Djokovic suffered an immediate
let-down in the third set, dropping his opening service, but he
stormed back with a double break
to edge in front two sets to one as
Murray ﬂagged. Fired-up, the top
seed then split the ﬁnal set wide
open, racing through the fourth
set against a spent Murray with
a triple break to surge to victory.
REUTERS
Sania to play doubles
at Qatar Open: QTF
DOHA: Indian tennis star Sania Mirza (pictured) has conﬁrmed
she will play in the doubles tournament at the 2015 Qatar Total
Open in February.
Mirza has a current WTA doubles ranking of No.5 and 23 doubles
titles to her credit as well as 13 ﬁnals including Roland Garros in 2011 with Elena Vesnina.
The two-time Indian Olympian is regarded
as her nation’s top sportswoman and has a
huge following.
The ofﬁcial Sania Mirza facebook fan page
has well over eight million people liking it and
her twitter account well over 2.3 million followers. The unofﬁcial pages for her are also
in the millions.
“Sania has such a strong presence wherever she goes around the world, but in Doha
that support is even more prominent. She has
proved herself on the court with some fantastic results and is a true quality player. The QTF is extremely happy
to have her attend the Qatar Total Open. We know plenty of people
will want to watch her play,” said Qatar Total Open Tournament
Director Saad Al Mohannadi.
In 2014 Mirza played with Cara Black all year and won the titles
in Tokyo, Estoril and the Year-End Championship and was a ﬁnalist
at four other events; Indian Wells, Stuttgart, Montreal and Beijing.
So far this year signiﬁcant results have seen Mirza reach the
semiﬁnals in Brisbane with Su-Wei Hsieh (Chinese Taipei) and the
ﬁnal in Sydney with Bethanie Mattek-Sands (United States).
She also has three Grand Slam mixed doubles titles to her name
and over the weekend made the semi-ﬁnals of the Australian Open
mixed draw with Brazil’s Bruno Soares.
There are 14 nations represented in the 20 player direct entry
singles list making the tournament a truly international event where
members of the public will almost certainly ﬁnd a player they can
support as their own.
Also conﬁrmed as an entry as a singles wildcard is No.8 Caroline
Wozniacki from Denmark.
THE PENINSULA
Evergreen
Serena
says she is
hungry for
more Grand
Slam glory
MELBOURNE:
With
her
name freshly engraved onto the
Australian Open trophy, Serena
Williams feels she can play on
indeﬁnitely and is intent on
increasing her tally of 19 Grand
Slams.
The American great, 33, scoffed
at talk of retirement after shooting down Maria Sharapova in
straight sets to win her sixth
title at Melbourne Park, becoming the oldest woman to ever lift
the trophy.
Williams has endured her share
of injury scares during a long
career, including a life-threatening pulmonary embolism in 2011
that sidelined her for 12 months.
But she said modern medicine
had helped keep her going.
“I can play as long as I like
now,” Williams said after moving to clear second on the list of
all-time Open-era Slam winners
behind Stefﬁ Graf on 22.
“With technology and stuff,
players are able to play longer. It
just depends on how long I want
to play
“I really don’t know (how long
that will be). I know I’m having
fun.
“I love winning championships,
I love holding trophies up at the
end of the week and more than
anything, I love to do the work to
get there.
“When that stops, I’ll probably
know that I’ve had enough,” she
added.
She said winning the opening
Slam of the season meant the
pressure was off for the rest of
2014, making the possibilities
seem endless.
The French Open?: “I want to
win Roland Garros.”
Wimbledon?: “Hmmm, I want
to get Wimbledon, that one’s been
eluding me for quite some time
and it’s annoying me.”
A calendar Grand Slam, which
would involve defending her US
Open title?: “Oh my gosh, I’m not
going to answer that,” throwing
her head back with laughter.
Graf ’s record is deﬁnitely on
her radar but she said it still
seemed a long way off.
“I would love to get to 22 -- I
mean 19 was very difﬁcult to get
to.
“Took me 33 years to get here,
so I would love to get there.
“But I have to get to 20 ﬁrst,
and then I have to get to 21.
There’s so many wonderful young
players coming up, so it will be a
very big task.”
Williams said the level of
emerging talent meant she needed
to act quickly if she wanted more
majors, although she sent young
guns such as Garbine Muguruza,
Madison Keys and Elina Svitolina
packing at Melbourne Park.
“So many young players are
coming up and doing really well,
that’s why I really cherish these
moments, you never know when
it’s going to happen again,” she
said.
“People are getting better by
the day.”
The American said the embolism, when she needed surgery
after blood clots were found on
both lungs, had made her determined to enjoy her career and
extend it as long as possible.
“I didn’t think I’d ever be back
on the court. I was in the hospital
thinking ‘am I going to make it
out?’,” she said.
“I was super cool, I didn’t
want to alarm my parents, and I
remember asking the doctor ‘will
I be able to play tennis again? It
was very interesting. It’s helped
me savour everything a little bit
more.”
Williams said she did not stop
to consider her achievements,
preferring to move on to the next
challenge.
“I don’t reﬂect on it too much, I
feel if I do reﬂect on it I’ll be very
excited, happy and maybe even
impressed,” she said.
“I think that would be a hinderance to me, I would become
too complacent. Then I’d be happy
and go on with my life, but I think
I should stay in tennis right now
-- I’m having too much fun.”
REUTERS
MONDAY 2 FEBRUARY 2015
www.thepeninsulaqatar.com
SPORT
Arsenal inch closer to top
four with Villa thrashing
Wenger’s side cruise to 5-0 victory, Shelvey nets winner for Swansea
LONDON:
Olivier
Giroud,
Mesut Ozil and Santi Cazorla
sparkled as Arsenal closed on
the Premier League’s top four
by crushing goal-shy Aston Villa
5-0 at the Emirates Stadium
yesterday.
Ozil freed Giroud to open the
scoring in the eighth minute and
the France striker returned the
favour in the second half before
goals from Theo Walcott, Cazorla
and Hector Bellerin completed a
one-sided victory.
It was a ﬁfth consecutive win
in all competitions for Arsene
Wenger’s men and took them
level on points with fourth-place
Southampton, who saw Ryan
Bertrand sent off in a 1-0 loss at
home to Swansea City.
“You cannot fault anyone’s
performance,” Wenger told Sky
Sports. “Mesut did well. It takes a
while to get that sharpness back.
“We had a rigorous attitude
defensively,” he said.
“Even at 4-0, 5-0 up, people
were willing to work back. We
want to play collectively and
offensively to the end,” added the
manager.
The defeat saw Paul Lambert’s
Villa – three points above the relegation zone in 16th place – set
an unwanted club record of six
consecutive league games without
scoring.
The Midlands club, who host
leaders Chelsea next weekend,
have gone 10 hours and 12 minutes
since Christian Benteke found the
net against Manchester United on
December 20.
“It is difﬁcult. When you don’t
EPL Results
Arsenal 5 (Giroud 8, Ozil 56, Walcott 63,
Cazorla 75-pen, Bellerin 90+2) Aston Villa 0
Southampton 0 Swansea 1 (Shelvey 83)
score, you don’t win games,”
Lambert said.
“You have to keep working hard
in training and hopefully it turns
around. We had chances to score,
but you have to take them.”
Ozil was making his ﬁrst league
start since October 5 and he
immediately made an impact by
cleverly using the outside of his
left foot to ﬂick a pass through
to Giroud.
The Frenchman had only Brad
Guzan to beat and after brieﬂy
getting ahead of the ball, he
calmly chipped the Villa goalkeeper to register his ﬁfth goal
in his last six league appearances.
After Cazorla had hit the post,
Ozil doubled Arsenal’s lead 11
minutes into the second half, gliding onto an elegant, piercing pass
from Giroud and trundling a shot
into the bottom-right corner.
Walcott had to wait even longer
for a league start, having last
started on New Year’s Day 2014
due to a serious knee injury, and
he marked the occasion by gathering Cazorla’s pass and curling
home in the 63rd minute.
Villa’s porous defence meant
that Alexis Sanchez’s absence
with a hamstring problem was
barely felt by Arsenal and after
Giroud had hit the bar with a
header, Cazorla added a fourth
goal from the penalty spot.
Guzan was penalised for tripping substitute Chuba Akpom
and despite getting a ﬁrm hand
to Cazorla’s powerful spot-kick,
which was hit straight at him, the
American could not keep it out.
Young full-back Bellerin got in
on the act in injury time, meeting
Cazorla’s lay-off with a precise,
side-foot shot from 20 yards that
went in via the base of the lefthand post.
Buoyed by recent wins over
Arsenal’s
Olivier Giroud
(12) celebrates
after scoring
a goal against
Aston Villa
during their
Premier League
match at the
Emirates
Stadium
in London,
yesterday.
Arsenal and Manchester United,
Southampton made an enterprising start against Swansea at St
Mary’s, with Nathaniel Clyne teeing up James Ward-Prowse for a
shot that Lukasz Fabianski saved
with brilliant effort.
But after hitting the post from
long range early in the second
half, Jonjo Shelvey gave Swansea
a smash-and-grab win in the 83rd
minute by crashing a shot inside
Fraser Forster’s right-hand post
from 25 yards.
Swansea captain Ashley
Williams produced two goal-line
blocks in quick succession to deny
Sadio Mane an equaliser before
Bertrand saw red for an ugly
challenge on Modou Barrow, who
was stretchered off.
Shelvey’s goal lifted Swansea to
ninth place and left Southampton
above Arsenal on goal difference
alone in the fourth and ﬁnal
Champions League qualifying
berth.
AFP
29
Celtic cruise
past Rangers
to League
Cup ﬁnal
GLASGOW: Celtic cruised into
the Scottish League Cup ﬁnal
with a comfortable 2-0 victory
over rivals Rangers in the ﬁrst
Old Firm derby in nearly three
years.
It wasn’t the record rout
that many predicted before the
match, but it was an entirely
uneven contest with the Scottish
Premiership leaders lauding it
over their city rivals to claim
victory in the 400th competitive
outing of one of the world’s ﬁercest rivalries.
Leigh Grifﬁths headed home
the opener after just 10 minutes
and Kris Commons, one of four
Celtic players in the starting 11
who had featured in the ﬁxture
previously, riﬂed home a second
in the 31st minute as the Hoops
threatened to run riot.
Celtic will now face Dundee
United in the ﬁnal on March
15 while Rangers, who are still
plagued by ﬁnancial problems
and boardroom battles, will refocus their attention on trying to
catch Hearts in the race for the
Scottish Championship.
“I think 2-0 was a fair result,”
Celtic manager Ronny Deila said.
“In the ﬁrst half we had four
chances and we scored two which
was okay. The second half we
didn’t have many but they didn’t
have a shot on target either.
“It was a very good day. There
was an unbelievable atmosphere
in the stadium and the players
were unbelievably focussed and
performed very well so I’m proud
of the boys.”
Rangers caretaker manager
Kenny McDowall was disappointed with the manner of the
goals his side conceded.
“We were set up to try and
keep it tight early on in the game
so to lose a goal like that threw a
spanner in works and unsettled
people,” McDowall said.
AFP
Balboa double stuns Tunisia
as hosts cruise into ﬁnal
Juventus’ Carlos Tevez reacts during their Italian Serie A match against
Udinese at the Friuli Stadium in Udine, yesterday.
Juventus spurn chance
for nine points lead
MILAN: Juventus spurned the
chance to go nine points clear
of title challengers Roma in a
scoreless draw away to Udinese
yesterday, as Napoli crept closer
to second place in Serie A.
Roma’s fourth consecutive draw
on Saturday had left Juventus the
chance to pull nine points clear of
the Giallorossi.
But on a day of several surprises in Italy’s top ﬂight, Udinese
held on to end a six-game losing
streak to the Turin giants to leave
them seven points clear of Roma.
Meanwhile Rafael Benitez’s
Napoli held on for a precious 2-1
win at Chievo to ﬁnish as the
only top ﬁve side to take all three
points, tightening their grip on
third place to now sit just four
behind Roma, who were held 1-1
by Empoli on Saturday.
Both Sampdoria and Lazio saw
their respective bids for a thirdplace ﬁnish dented by respective
defeats to Torino and Cesena.
Samuel Eto’o’s debut for
Sampdoria ended in a chastening
5-1 defeat away to Torino, with
former Juventus striker Fabio
Quagliarella hitting a hat-trick
to send Giampiero Ventura’s side
up to ninth in the table.
Eto’o arrived at the Genoabased club from Everton last
week, signing a three-and-ahalf year deal then declaring
his “dream” to help lead Samp
into contention for next season’s
Champions League.
But after a three-game
unbeaten run, Samp were humbled in stunning fashion as
Quagliarella gave the hosts a 2-0
lead by the break including one
from the spot on the half hour.
Quagliarella completed his
hat-trick in the 65th minute,
with further goals from Amauri
and Bruno Peres either side of
a Pedro Obiang consolation for
Samp securing a memorable win
at the Olympic Stadium.
Samp’s slip proved costly,
especially in the light of Napoli’s
2-1 away win over Chievo which
tightened their grip on the last
Champions League qualifying
position.
Manolo Gabbiadini helped give
the visitors an 18th minute lead
when his shot came off the head
of Bostjan Cesar in comical fashion to ﬁnish in the back of the net.
After Miguel Britos scored
an own goal for Napoli to level
the score seven minutes later,
Gabbiadini – signed from
Sampdoria two months ago –
rescued the points with a 62nd
minute winner.
AFP
BATA: Javier Balboa scored
a controversial penalty and
then a stunning free kick winner as tiny Equatorial Guinea
produced one of the greatest
African Nations Cup shocks
by eliminating Tunisia 2-1
after extra time in Saturday’s
quarter-ﬁnal.
A soft penalty in stoppage time
allowed Equatorial Guinea to level
when Tunisia seemed destined
for the semi-ﬁnals after Ahmed
Akaichi put the highly fancied
North Africans 1-0 ahead in the
70th minute.
Balboa converted the kick to
take the game to an additional
30 minutes and curled home a
stunning set piece in the 102nd
minute to win the game and set
off jubilant celebrations across the
small country.
Equatorial Guinea now take
on either Ghana or Guinea, who
clash in their quarter-ﬁnal in
Malabo.
Saturday’s match will be
remembered as much for the
fairytale win as for the violent
scenes throughout the game and
after the ﬁnal whistle.
The
Mauritian
referee
Seechurn Rajindraparsad was
the central ﬁgure as he handed
Equatorial Guinea a controversial lifeline and then found himself attacked by furious Tunisian
players as he was sped from the
ﬁeld by security ofﬁcials.
As the hosts partied, ﬁst ﬁghts
started between the rival players
with both benches at one stage
laying into each other in unseemly
scenes.
Amazingly no players or ofﬁcials were shown red cards.
Tunisia were the better side
in a game that had niggle almost
from the start and made the
breakthrough when Yassine
Chuikahoui swept the ball out
wide for Mohamed Ali Yakoubi
to deliver a cross to Akaichi, who
stole in behind the defence.
As the game headed into ﬁve
Bremen’s Franco di Santo
cheers after his ﬁrst goal during
the Bundesliga match against
Hertha BSC in the Weserstadion
in Bremen, Germany, yesterday.
Di Santos drags
Bremen out of
bottom three
Javier Balboa of Equatorial Guinea celebrates after scoring the second
goal against Tunisia during their quarter-ﬁnal match of the 2015 African
Cup of Nations in Bata on Saturday.
minutes of stoppage time, an
innocuous looking challenge from
Hamza Mathlouthi on Ivan Bolado
saw the referee award a penalty
that put Equatorial Guinea back
in the contest.
That set off a massive sulk from
Tunisia that continued through
extra time, exacerbated when
Aymen Abdennour gave away a
free kick outside his area that
Balboa expertly curled home.
It was the fourth goal of the
tournament for the former Real
Madrid winger, now the competition’s top scorer.
Earlier on Saturday at the
Estadio de Bata, the Democratic
Republic of Congo came from 2-0
down to beat Congo 4-2 to become
the ﬁrst team into the last four.
REUTERS
BERLIN: Argentina striker
Franco di Santos marked his
return from injury with both
goals as Werder Bremen climbed
out of the relegation places in
yesterday’s 2-0 win over Hertha
Berlin.
The ex-Chelsea and Wigan
forward, who missed the ﬁnal
few league games of 2014 with a
knee injury, produced two clinical strikes either side of half-time
to give Werder the three points
which lifted them from 16th to
12th.
Defeat at Bremen drops Hertha
to 15th and just above the relegation zone, but things remain tight
at the foot of the table with just
three points separating the bottom six teams.
On
Saturday,
Borussia
Dortmund slipped back to the
bottom for the ﬁrst time since
November despite picking up a
point in their goalless draw at fellow Champions League side Bayer
Leverkusen’s BayArena.
“That was an important point.
I am happy, we’re within striking distance (of mid-table),” said
Dortmund coach Jurgen Klopp,
whose side are enduring their
worst start to a league season in
30 years.
“I can’t preach that we are in
a relegation battle and demand
champagne football.”
AFP
30
MONDAY 2 FEBRUARY 2015
www.thepeninsulaqatar.com
SPORT
Qatar 2015 Men’s World Handball Championship comes to a spectacular ﬁnish
A spectacular
view of ﬁreworks
outside the Lusail
Multipurpose Hall,
outside Doha,
following the
closing ceremony
of the 24th Men’s
Handball World
Championship,
last night. RIGHT:
Players of France
lift the trophy
after beating
Qatar in the ﬁnal.
PICTURES BY: SALIM
MATRAMKOT/BAHIR
AMIN
Qatar 2015 hosts dazzling closing ceremony
A young Qatari fan smiles during
the ﬁnal. BELOW: Polish goalkeeper
Slawomir Szmal during the medal
ceremony.
DOHA: A capacity crowd in
the Lusail Multipurpose Hall
saw the curtain fall on the
24th Men’s Handball World
Championship yesterday, as
Qatar dazzled the world once
more with an incredible sporting spectacle in which they ﬁnished runners-up.
In all, 24 national teams, hundreds of players, and thousands of
fans have come together for the
Championship, which has raised
the bar for major sporting events
in the region and made a signiﬁcant contribution to development
of the sport of handball.
Over the past 17 days, visitors
have been surprised and delighted
by a host of special guests and
exciting events – and the closing
ceremony lived up to these high
expectations.
As well as marking the end
of Qatar 2015, the closing event
functioned as a symbolic handover to France, which will host
the next Men’s World Handball
Championship in 2017.
The ceremony began with a
moving rendition of the national
anthem of Qatar performed by
children of the Siwar Choir and
was followed by a range of traditional performances that showcased Qatari culture.
The championship’s beloved
mascot Fahed waved to the
crowds, and was joined by a group
of French children for the Ofﬁcial
Song of the Championship, “Live
it”, which has now been seen
more than six million times on
YouTube. During the ceremony,
Dr. Hassan Moustafa, President
of the International Handball
Federation (IHF) delivered a
speech thanking the Qatar 2015
Organising Committee for the
hugely successful event and
thanked visiting teams and delegations for their participation in
the championship.
In the exciting ﬁnal, France
beat Qatar 25-22 to claim the trophy of the 24th Men’s Handball
World Championship. Poland
came in third place after defeating Spain, with a match score of
29-28.
At the awards ceremony, the
Emir H H Sheikh Tamim bin
Hamad Al Thani, and Moustafa,
presented the new world champions France with their gold
medals.
Moustafa also presented the
team with the newly unveiled
championship trophy that has
been designed and conceptualised in Qatar. The replacement
of the trophy is a championship
ﬁrst and has been presented by
the State of Qatar to the IHF as
a new trophy for all future tournaments. The old trophy will be
kept at a museum at the IHF
Headquarters.
Second place winner, Qatar
was awarded silver medals and
bouquets by H E Sheikh Ahmed
Al Fahad Al Sabah, President,
Olympic Council of Asia and
Miguel Roca Mas, 1st Vice
President, International Handball
Federation.
H E Sheikh Joaan bin Hamad
Al Thani, President of the Qatar
2015 Organising Committee and
Frantisek Taborsky, Executive
Committee Member, International
Handball Federation presented
the third place and bronze medals to Poland.
Following the awards ceremony,
in a symbolic handover to France,
H E Sheikh Joaan handed the
IHF ﬂag to Dr. Hassan marking
the end of the championship.
The President of the IHF in
turn handed the ﬂag over to Joel
Delplanque, President of the
French Handball Federation as
they prepare to host the next edition of the tournament in 2017.
The France 2017 Committee has
toured the Qatar 2015 venues this
week and publically congratulated
Qatar for the high level of professionalism and incredible range of
facilities at the championship.
The closing ceremony ﬁnished with performances by
international music artists Kylie
Minogue, Taio Cruz and Mani
Hoffman. Spectators were also
treated to an incredible ﬁrework
Qatari fans
celebrate a
goal during
the ﬁnal
between
Qatar and
France.
RIGHT:
A fan
supporting
France
gestures
during the
match
A supporter of
France has a
picture taken
with a woman
at the Lusail
Multipurpose
Hall. RIGHT:
Fans backing
France during
their ﬁnal
against Qatar.
display, as Lusail Multipurpose
Hall was illuminated for the night.
After the closing event, coaches,
fans and international sporting
representatives had warm words
for the success of Qatar.
Claude Onesta, Coach of the
French national team, said:
“This is a tournament organised
to the highest level imaginable.
We didn’t come across any problems. We had top teams from all
around the world and it was very
stimulating.” Speaking about the
spectator support at the championship, Hadi Hamdoon, Right
Back on the Qatari national team,
said: “I have never played in front
of so many enthusiastic supporters in my life before. It was awesome, a unique experience for
me.”
The 24th Men’s Handball
World Championship has created
several sporting ﬁrsts for Qatar
and has demonstrated the capability of the nation to host major
international events.
The Qatar 2015 Organising
Committee has partnered with
some of the country’s leading
companies that have leveraged
their expertise towards the success of the event and the collaborative efforts between partners,
committee members, workforce
and volunteers has established
Qatar as major global sports-hub.
THE PENINSULA
A young Qatari fan gestures during
the ﬁnal. BELOW: A young boy
points to the trophy during the
podium ceremony of 24th Men’s
Handball World Championships at
the Lusail Multipurpose Hall, last
night.
MONDAY 2 FEBRUARY 2015
www.thepeninsulaqatar.com
SPORT
31
Qatar ready to host any sporting event, says Sheikh Joaan
DOHA: The Chairman of the
Higher Organising Committee
for the 2015 World Men’s
Handball Championship, H E
Sheikh Joaan bin Hamad Al
Thani (pictured), has conﬁrmed
that Qatar is always ready to
host any sporting event, stressing that the Gulf nation is prepared to enter the competition
for hosting any championship in
the future.
Addressing a press conference
at the close of the 24th Men’s
World Handball Championship,
H E Sheikh Joaan said the Qatar
Handball Association (QHA) has
a clear strategy aimed to improve
handball and to continue achieving successes that has occurred
during the current championship
in which Qatar reached the ﬁnals
to compete for the title.
He explained that the Qatari
team’s great achievement in this
championship is not only for the
Qatar but for the Arab world at
large, adding that he watched
a lot of interaction from neighbouring countries with the Qatari
team.
H E Sheikh Joaan also noted
that this achievement is also
attributed to the QHA which
worked for many years on improving the performance of handball
in the country.
He noted that in November
Qatar will host the Asian qualiﬁers for the Olympic Games in Rio,
pointing out that all
facilities built for
this tournament will
be used for the beneﬁt of handball not
only in Qatar but
worldwide.
Sheikh
Joaan
thanked the media
that participated in
the coverage of the
championship and
which played a great
role in the success of
the championship.
He also thanked the President
of the International Handball
Federation (IHF) Dr Hassan
Moustafa and all the federation
ofﬁcials for their effort.
The President
of the IHF in turn
thanked H E Sheikh
Joaan, the State of
Qatar and all the
participants
for
making 24th Men’s
Handball
World
Championship a
success.
Moustafa also
thanked the CEO
of beIN SPORT,
Nasser Al Khelaiﬁ,
for the network’s magniﬁcent
broadcast of the championship
with the latest technology.
He praised the efforts being
exerted by the organising committee in solving all the problems
that have occurred during the
championship, in the presence
of 24 teams from different continents who came to Doha
with their various cultures and
customs.
On the level of the tournament
in general, Moustafa said that
the technical level of the participating teams was strong and all
games were played with parity
and excitement, noting that it is
the ﬁrst time teams from outside
Europe have reached the ﬁnals,
pointing out that the World Cup
in Doha took the game in the
right way towards its promotion
and dissemination among all
countries of the world.
He stressed that the excellent
Poland take bronze after
extra time against Spain
Runners-up at the 2007 worlds edge defending champions 29-28
DOHA: The runners-up at
the 2007 world championship, Poland, edged defending champions Spain 29-28 in
extra time to clinch the bronze
medal at the 24th Men’s World
Championship here yesterday.
The Iberians and the Poles
were tied 24-24 at the end of 60
minutes of normal play.
Both teams had scoring problems at the beginning of the
match but Poland were the ﬁrst
team to solve them and went up
3-0 after the ﬁrst ﬁve-and-a-half
minutes, causing Spain’s coach
Manuel Cadenas to call a timeout.
The Polish defence and goalkeeper Slawomir Szmal continued to do very well, though, and it
took Spain seven minutes and 11
seconds to score their ﬁrst goal, as
Albert Rocas reduced the deﬁcit
to 3-1 on a counter-attack.
However, Poland continued to
dominate, much to the joy of their
many fans at Lusail Multipurpose
Hall, and increased their lead to
5-1, 6-2 and 7-3.
A more offensive Spanish
defence and an improved performance by Gonzalo Perez de
Varga in the Spanish goal brought
Spain into the game, and after 22
minutes, left-back Antonio Garcia
equalised with 11-11.
This was as far as the Spaniards
got in the ﬁrst-half, but they
never managing to take the lead.
A ﬁrst-half with a relatively
large number of technical mistakes on both sides also ended
equal, as the score read 13-13
after the ﬁrst 30 minutes.
This Spaniards broke the tie in
the ﬁrst minute of the second half,
though, as their huge line player
Julen Aguinagalde gave them
their ﬁrst lead in the match at
14-13.
Spain continued to have a onegoal lead right up until rightwing Victor Tomas made use of a
IHF President Dr Hassan Moustafa
addresses a news conference in
Doha yesterday.
No change in
nationality
rules for now,
says IHF boss
BY ARMSTRONG VAS
Polish players celebrate after defeating Spain in third-place match of the 24th Men’s Handball World Championship at Lusail Multipurpose Hall near
Doha yesterday.
counter-attack to put them two
up at 19-17, 12 minutes into the
second-half.
It was also Tomas who gave
Spain a three-goal lead at 21-18
with less than 14 minutes left,
which forced Poland’s coach
Michael Biegler to call his last
timeout.
This helped, as Poland managed
to come back from a four goal deficit and draw 24-24 before winning by one goal after two times
ﬁve minutes of extra time
Michal Szyba scored eight goals
for Poland and Victor Tomas
seven for Spain.
“All the players were fantastic.
We have been mentally prepared
for this match despite losing in
the semi-ﬁnal. It was difﬁcult to
maintain focus, but I am proud
of how we did it,” said Poland’s
Michal Daszek.
“We didn’t expect such a good
result especially after our preliminary round. We had a tough
schedule, Sweden and Croatia on
our way to the semis. That makes
this result even bigger,” he added
Speaking about the 2016
European championship in
Poland, Daszek said: “This is the
best preparation for our home
tournament. I hope that we can
win a gold in front of our home
fans.”
Spain’s Juan Andreu expressed
disappointment at their defeat. “It
is a terrible feeling. I am very sad
because we had the game and the
medal in our hands and gave it
to Poland. There is no doubt that
they have a very good team and
played better in the overtime, but
I blame us for the result.”
Right-wing Victor Tomas said:
“When you lose a game like that,
there are not many things to say.
We fought and tried to win and
win the medal, but it didn’t work
out. We didn’t play at the maximum and that cost us a lot. Poland
are a very strong team, but our
mistakes have been proved fatal
tonight.”
THE PENINSULA
France takes hosts’ baton from Qatar
DOHA: France — hosts of the
next world championship — has
given the thumbs-up to Qatar
for doing “a great job” of hosting
the 24th Men’s Handball World
Championship while promising
to maintain the high standards
set up by the 2015 hosts.
“The organisers did a great job,
now it is our joy and responsibility to take the baton from Doha.
The 2017 World Championship
is a great opportunity to promote handball in France and all
over the world,” Joel Delplanque,
Chairman of the Organising
Committee of France 2017, said
here while addressing a press conference at the French embassy.
France will host the 25th Men’s
Handball World Championship in
2017 and the journey has already
started in Qatar.
Both ﬁnalists — France and
Qatar — are the ﬁrst two teams
to be conﬁrmed participants of
this event, which will be staged
from January 16 to 29 in 10 cities
throughout France.
The International Handball
Federation (IHF) hopes the event
to be staged in 10 cities will be a
sold-out event.
organisation of the tournament
in Doha should inspire the rest
of the countries in the region to
do their utmost to have the privilege of organising international
tournaments.
Moustafa said all 125 doping
tests conducted during the championship came up negative, which
demonstrates the integrity of the
tournament.
Qatar
2015
Organising
Committee’s Director General
Dr Thani Al Kuwari said the
organising committee worked 24
hours a day during the tournament and held three meetings
with the International Handball
Federation to get briefed on their
observations.
QNA
French Secretary of State for Sports Thierry Braillard speaks after signing
a cooperation agreement in the ﬁeld of sports between France and Qatar
in Doha yesterday.
IHF President Dr Hassan
Moustafa is even conﬁdent to
break the spectator record for the
world championships in France.
“In 2007 in Germany 750,000
tickets were sold. I believe in
France we can break the one million mark,” he said.
France will host a handball
World Championship for the
fourth time after two men’s
events in 1970 and 2001 and the
women’s event in 2007.
“All those World Championships
had been milestones for handball.
The 2007 event is still the record
holder for women’s events in
terms of ticket sales,” Moustafa
said, praising the French Handball
Federation. “You are well known
as excellent organisers.”
The 2017 World Championship
will take place in Aix-enProvence, Albertville, Brest,
Lille, Metz, Montpellier, Nancy,
Nantes, Paris and Rouen including the football stadium in Lille
and the Arena Paris-Bercy, where
the ﬁnal weekend will be staged
as in 2001 and 2007.
Like in Doha, 24 teams will
compete for the medals in the
same playing system with preliminary round, knock-out-stage
and President’s Cup. The qualiﬁcation will start in January 2016
with the European, African and
Asian championships, followed by
the European play-offs and the
Pan-American championships in
June 2016.
In March 2015 the organisers of France 2017 will unveil
the logo and the website for this
event. The French Federation
was awarded in December 2011
to host this event in Sao Paolo,
Brazil. France will also host the
Women’s European Championship
in 2018.
After France, the next Men’s
Handball World Championship
will be organised jointly by
Germany and Denmark in 2019
after the decision of the IHF
Council in Doha in October 2014.
Yesterday’s press conference
was attended by Jean Brihault,
President of the European
Handball Federation; Thierry
Braillard, French Secretary of
State for Sports.
THE PENINSULA
Dejected Spanish player Antonio
Jesus Garcia reacts after losing
the third-place match against
Poland at the Lusail Multipurpose
Hall outside Doha yesterday.
The
International
DOHA:
Handball Federation (IHF) has
no immediate plans to change
the nationality rules for players, IHF President Dr Hassan
Moustafa said yesterday.
The IHF chief said the power
to bring about amendments and
change rules of the game vest with
the IHF Congress and not with
the IHF Executive Committee
headed by him.
The IHF has relaxed rules
regarding nationality, which
permit players to opt to play
for another country even if they
have previously represented
another team at an international
competition, including a world
championship.
“Till now, no association had
sought a change in rules regarding
the nationality of players. If any
association plans to bring about
any amendments to the prevailing rules then they will have to
go through the congress, which
will be put to vote,” said Moustafa
while addressing a press conference here yesterday.
“The IHF Executive Council
has nothing to do with this issue
(nationality rules). This question belongs to the rules and
regulations of the IHF and it is
decided by the IHF Congress,”
Moustafa said while reacting to
questions regarding Qatar ﬁelding
European-born players.
“This has become a hot (topic)
and I want to make it clear to all,”
added the IHF chief.
Moustafa, while defending
Qatar’s decision to take on their
rolls players born in Europe, said:
“The system doesn’t belong to
Qatar only. Qatar used the facility that has been provided by the
Congress. It is (the same) for all
200 IHF members. Anyone can
use this and become strong.”
Moustafa also clariﬁed that
Qatar has ﬁelded only four
European-born players.
“As per the information which
has been provided to me, Qatar
has ﬁelded only four players who
were born in Europe and grew up
in that continent, while the rest of
the players were born in Qatar or
their parents have been working
here. Besides the four (European
born players), all other players
have been based in Qatar for
many years.”
On Friday, Qatar became the
ﬁrst non-European country to
make it to the ﬁnal of a world
championship. Earlier, only Korea
had been able to enter the quarter-ﬁnals in 2007, while two other
non-European teams — Egypt and
Tunisia — made it to the last-four
stage of a championship.
Qatar, hosts of the 2015 championship, has not been able to
make it past the last-16 stage in
four earlier attempts and this is
their best performance.
THE PENINSULA
Sport
Maxwell leads
Aussies to
Tri-series win
Monday 2 February 2015
13 Rabial II 1436
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Nikola Karabatic of France lifts the winners’ trophy after his team won the 24th Men’s Handball World Championship ﬁnal against Qatar at Lusail Multipurpose Hall outside Doha last night. RIGHT: Qatar’s players wave during
the awards ceremony after the ﬁnal of the 24th Men’s Handball World Championship last night.
PICTURES: SALIM MATRAMKOT
France win record
ﬁfth world title
Qatar settle for silver after narrow defeat
DOHA: Reigning Olympic and
European champions France
lived up to their favourites tag
to overcome a ﬁghting surprise
ﬁnalists Qatar 25-22 to win the
24th Men’s Handball World
Championship.
Yesterday at the Lusail
Multipurpose Hall here, France,
which last won in 2011, clinched
their ﬁfth world title, the ﬁrst
team to do.
Coach Claude Onesta’s boys
thus notched a memorable triple
crown, adding to the Olympic and
European title, thereby stamping
their dominance on the sport.
Onesta’s game plan yesterday
was simple — stop Qatar’s two
most dangerous and consistent
shooters, Zarko Markovic and
Rafael Capote from scoring.
The plan worked for Les Blues
as the two top scorers of the
squad coached by Valero Rivera
netted only one goal each until the
17th minute.
At the other end, France’s
Serbian-born Nikola Karabatic
scored three times in the ﬁrst 17
minutes as the pre-tournament
favourites established a four-goal
lead at 9-5 over the hosts, who
were playing their maiden ﬁnal.
Karabatic along with Daniel
Narcisse’s early ﬁrepower allowed
France to take control over the
proceedings and set a platform
for victory.
At one stage France threatened
to be a runaway winners taking a
13-7 lead in the 23rd minute.
But Qatar, backed by a vociferous capacity crowd, came back
strongly through Markovic and
Capote.
The duo scored four goals in
the last six minutes of the ﬁrsthalf and with Danijel Saric’s outstanding show between the posts,
the hosts managed to narrow
the score-difference to 14-11 by
half-time.
In the second half, the hosts
Qatar make handball
history at home
DOHA: Qatar made history by becoming the ﬁrst country outside Europe to ever reach the ﬁnal of a men’s handball world
championship — but were in the end unlucky against France who
stopped them from going all the way last night.
Before the Championship, Qatar had never defeated a European
team in a competitive match but that certainly changed in this
world championship.
Slovenia became their ﬁrst European victims in the group phase,
in the pre-quarter-ﬁnal they won against Austria and in the quarterﬁnal Germany had to bite the dust. Poland became the fourth team
to be beaten by the new Qatari team, who qualiﬁed for the ﬁnal by
defeating the Poles 31-29 in the semi-ﬁnal in the Lusail Multipurpose
Hall of Doha.
And in the ﬁnal they were at par with European, Olympic, and
now again world champions, France. Until the 55th minute in yesterday’s ﬁnal, the team of coach Valero Rivera had gold in sight but
were denied by an experienced French.
But a silver medal is quite a change compared to the last world
championship two years ago in Spain, when the Qataris ﬁnished 20th.
On their way to the ﬁnal, the home team lost only one match.
The decisive match for ﬁrst place in their preliminary group against
Spain was lost 28-25 but Qatar still ended up in the ﬁnal, while the
Spaniards, defending world champions from 2013, had to play for
bronze instead.
A strong goalkeeper duo played a great part in Qatar’s success.
Danijel Saric and Goran Stojanovic supported each other brilliantly
over this competition.
THE PENINSULA
maintained the ﬁrst half tempo
and managed to narrow the goal
difference to 18-17, 40 minutes
into the match.
France increased the lead to
22-19 and then to 24-21.
And with three minutes left for
the ﬁnal whistle, Qatar’s rightwing Abdulla Al Karbi missed two
decisive chances, which in the end
made a huge difference.
At the other end, France’s
Narcisse made the most of the
chance he got to net his fourth
goal in the last minute of the
match to kick-off celebrations on
the court and in the stands.
Karbatic top-scored for
France with ﬁve goals while Zarko
netted seven and Capote six for
Qatar.
Qatar’s coach Rivera said his
team gave a good display throughout the championship.
“I am proud of my team for
their performance in the championship. They played good handball
for 60 minutes today but to beat a
team like France you need to play
well throughout the match. I am
very happy for everything. This
country, this association and this
team deserve this silver medal.
I dedicate this achievement to
the Qatar Handball Association
and to my three grandchildren,”
the Spaniard said.
THE PENINSULA