Mechanism for issuing licence tightened to reduce traffic accidents. Traffic Department is preparing unified curriculum in more than 18 languages which are commonly used in Qatar. New system to remove chances of driving test manipulation.

BUSINESS | 17 SPORT | 21Nadal brushes off Thiem to reach semis in Monte Carlo

Japan warns G20 protectionism will

disrupt markets

Volume 23 | Number 7503 | 2 RiyalsSaturday 21 April 2018 | 5 Sha’baan I 1439 www.thepeninsula.qa

8 more languages to be added to driving curriculum

DOHA: The General Directorate of Traffic is poised to make driving training more effective by adding eight more languages to driving curriculum which is currently available in 10 languages.

Captain Khalid Abdulaziz Al Ghanim from Licensing Section and General Supervisor of Driving Schools at the General Directorate of Traffic has dis-closed that the reason behind high percentage of failure in driving licence test shows the keenness of the Department to reduce traffic accidents.

“The Department has tightened mechanisms of issuing driving licence and the aim is to decrease the rate of injuries and deaths resulting from traffic accidents,” Al Ghanim told The Peninsula.

Regarding the issue of the Unified Smart Training System in all driving schools, he said that the department is preparing a unified curriculum in more than 18 languages which are com-monly used in Qatar instead of the existing 10 languages.

“This will make tests more easier for people, especially the ones who are not educated because when they will be taught traffic laws in their languages they will understand them better.”

“We are keen that the trainees must know Qatari traffic rules fully, especially the most common traffic violations

to avoid them in driving like jumping red signal, parking at the spaces reserved for people with special needs etc,” he pointed out.

Al Ghanim has affirmed that every trainee has digital device in classrooms loaded with a comprehensive traffic cur-riculum consisting of audio and video information explaining the traffic rules and most common violations. He added that among the positives of the unified smart training system is the fact that it was being implemented in all driving schools.

“The system also removes the chances of manipulation related to driving test and it records total hours that a trainee must attend. The cur-riculum was developed on the basis of training and interna-tional standards and also illit-erate students who are unable to read and write in their lan-guages can benefit from it.”

Brigadier Mohammed Saad Al Kharji, the General Director of General Directorate of Traffic said earlier in an interview with The Peninsula that banning many job categories from applying for driving licence is a temporary decision and not a permanent one.

“Once the construction of roads is completed, the banned professions will be allowed to apply for driving licences. Actually, I cannot say it was a ‘ban’ but I can say it is just tem-porary decision” he had stressed.

SIDI MOHAMED THE PENINSULA

President of the Qatar Olympic Committee H E Sheikh Joaan bin Hamad Al Thani awarded yesterday the winners of the four main races of the seventh day of Arabian Camels Race Competition on the sword of H H the Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, which was held in Al Shahaniya racetrack.

Sheikh Joan awards winners of HH the Emir’s Camel Race

Qatari Economic Tour expo begins in RaleighQNA

RALEIGH: The accompanying exhibition of the ‘Qatari Economic Tour in the US’ in Raleigh, North Carolina, began yesterday. The two-day event aims to highlight Qatar’s cultural heritage and strong economic potential, in addition to famil-iarising visitors with the major development projects that are being implemented to achieve Qatar National Vision 2030, including projects related to the 2022 FIFA World Cup.

The exhibition will bring together representatives from major institutions in Qatar, including the Ministry of Economy and Commerce, Supreme Committee for Delivery & Legacy, Qatar Airways, Doha Film Institute and Qatar Foun-dation along with a number of

US companies that have part-nered in investment projects with Qatar, such as Occidental Petroleum, Boeing, ExxonMobil and ConocoPhillips.

Through its special pavilion at the exhibition, the Ministry of Economy and Commerce has sought to focus on the advan-tages of the Qatari economy and to highlight the depth of the stra-tegic partnership between Qatar and the US by providing inter-active infographic designs that address the fundamentals of the business environment in Qatar and present the most prominent Qatari investments in the US as well as to present the progress of bilateral relations between the two countries in various fields.

The Doha Film Institute’s pavilion also highlights the foun-dation’s latest films, awards and decorations along with key

information on financing the film and production sector.

The Qatar Foundation for Education, Science and Com-munity Development’s wing presents a range of infographic designs on its programs in edu-cation, scientific research and community development, and highlights sustainable cooper-ation between Qatar and US in education, in view of the presence of six US universities in Qatar.

Meanwhile, the Ministry of Economy and Commerce, in cooperation with US-Qatar Business Council in Raleigh, organised a panel discussion on how to establish and facilitate business and introduce the American business community.

The meeting, held within the framework of the Ministry’s tour in the US, discussed several topics

such as how to benefit from the various programs in America, how to cooperate and ways to develop export opportunities and trade with the US, as well as the chal-lenges that Qatari companies can face in America, especially when doing business, and how to deal with these challenges.

Director of Business Devel-opment and Investment Pro-motion Department at the Min-istry of Economy and Commerce Abdul Basset Al Ajji, said that the Ministry issued a comprehensive booklet in Arabic and English, containing all important infor-mation for investors like regis-tration mechanisms and infor-mation on the commercial sectors, and also contains the addresses of all government agencies related to the field of investment.

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Cityscape Qatar 2018 begins tomorrowQNA

DOHA: The seventh edition of Cityscape Qatar will take place tomorrow at Doha Exhibition and Convention Center (DECC) and will run until April 25.

This year’s show boasts a lineup of up to 50 exhibitors across more than 9,000sqm of exhibition space, and will bring together heav-yweight industry stakeholders from Qatar and abroad including Turkey, Georgia, Cyprus, US, Pakistan, and the UK.

For home-buyers and investors, the four-day exhibition will provide an opportunity to network, gain valuable market insight, and take advantage of exclusive deals, special offers and payment plans on the show floor.

For his part, Exhibition Manager at City-scape Qatar Faariss Khalil, said visitors attending the show over the next few days will get an exclusive look into dynamic projects shaping the country.

Khalil added that Cityscape Qatar will give

investors, devel-opers and real estate professionals the oppor- tunity to gain insight into the country’s evolving real estate market through a wide range of projects.

Qatar Rail, Katara Hospitality, Msheireb Properties, Qatari Diar and QNB are among exhibitors who will join Cityscape Qatar for the first time.

Alongside a host of projects to be show-cased at the exhibition is the Cityscape Qatar

Conference, hosted by DTZ Qatar, which is expected to welcome over two hundred delegates.

General Manager of DTZ and this years Conference Chairman Edd Brookes com-mented: “We are thrilled to have Cityscape 2018 extended to four days while hosting some of leading real estate companies from Qatar and abroad.

“This years Cityscape is set to be a cracker of an event offering real insight into the property world of Qatar.”

A Qatari market overview is one of the highly-anticipated topics on the agenda, while the Conferences panel discussions take an in-depth look at inbound and outbound investment opportunities, delve into smart and sustainable buildings, and offer updates on the hospitality sector.

Cityscape Qatar Talks runs parallel to the exhibition, and includes a stellar programme with experts from across the real estate sector.

Qatar a rising star location for business meetings, says reportTHE PENINSULA

DOHA: Qatar is a rising star location for planners for hosting business meetings and corporate events.

A recent report published in South China Morning Post with headline “Qatar and Austria are rising star locations for business visitors from Asia” suggests that “the two long-haul destinations rank highly with planners as locations for hosting business meetings and corporate events.”

Event planners in Asia are increasingly looking beyond the region for hosting their business meetings and corporate events. With more airlines to choose

from and lower travel costs than ever before, hosting an event at a long-haul destination is no longer considered a luxury, it adds.

With the increase in visitors from Asia in recent years, some of the global meetings, incen-tives, conventions, exhibitions (MICE) destinations have redi-rected their focus from US and European markets to Asia for growth. Among them, Qatar in the Middle East and Austria in Europe have become more prominent with their improved tourism infrastructures and marketing efforts, the report says.

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This year’s show boasts a lineup of

up to 50 exhibitors across more than

9,000sqm of exhibition space

02 SATURDAY 21 APRIL 2018HOME

HMC hosts Qatar Stars League members THE PENINSULA

DOHA: Hamad Medical Corpo-ration (HMC) hosted members of the Qatar Stars League previous week when they visited Hamad bin Khalifa Medical City with the Qatar Cup.

Previously called the Heir Apparent Cup, the Qatar Cup is one of the major sporting highlights of the Qatari football calendar, showcasing the top four teams in the league.

The delegation from the Qatar Stars League visited the new Medical City hospitals – the Qatar Rehabilitation Institute (QRI), the Ambulatory

Care Center (ACC), and the Women’s Wellness and Research Center (WWRC) – on April 16 and took the oppor-tunity to tour the new facilities while also meeting with staff, patients, and visitors.

The event was arranged by the Corporate Communications Department’s public relations team and aimed to provide staff, patients, and visitors with the opportunity to learn about the Qatar Cup and the tour-nament while also having an opportunity to meet with some of the team’s players, take pic-tures, and see the trophy up close.

The trophy features a dis-

tinctive design and was man-ufactured locally.

Members of the delegation expressed their appreciation to HMC for organising the event, commenting they were grateful for the opportunity to talk about their sport and promote the upcoming semi-final matches.

The tour was part of a roadshow being organised by the Qatar Stars League to promote the upcoming tour-nament. It included players from the Al Duhail, Al Sadd, Al Rayyan, Al Gharafa teams. The winner of the Qatar Cup will be announced after the final match on April 27.

The members of the Qatar Stars League, with HMC officials, during their visit to Hamad bin Khalifa Medical City with the Qatar Cup.

Katara Publishing House to boost Qatar’s cultural life THE PENINSULA

DOHA: Katara Publishing House was opened on Thursday at a ceremony which also saw honouring of a noted Qatari poet and writer Dr Hassan Al Nama.

The opening ceremony at Katara Cultural Village was attended by Their Excellencies ministers, writers, academics, diplomats and a number of other dignitaries.

Minister of Energy and Industry H E Dr Mohammed bin Saleh Al Sada; Minister of State H E Dr Hamad bin Abdul Aziz Al Kawari; and former ministers, Dr Mohammed Abdul Raheem Kafoud and Dr Hajar Ahmed Hajar Al Binali were among those who were present.

Dr bin Ibrahim Al Sulaiti, General Manager of Katara Cul-tural Village, in his opening address, said that Katara Pub-lishing House represented a major step towards promoting Qatari creativity in culture, art, heritage and knowledge.

“This initiative of Katara is a new addition to the printing and publishing activities in Qatar. It will support Qatari writers by publishing their works and introducing them to the world through international book fairs in Qatar and overseas,” said Al Sulaiti.

He said Katara, through the publishing house will focus on

bringing out books with high standards in terms of pro-duction, publication and circulation.

He noted that the novels, critical studies and other books published by Katara on Qatari culture, heritage and traditions had been well received by the public.

“Through the establishment of Katara Publishing House, we wish to reinforce the cultural, literary and intellectual life in Qatar and the region, for the benefit of the present and future generations, considering the importance of books in pro-moting human thinking,” said Al Sulaiti.

Al Sulaiti then presented Katara’s first annual “Litterateur Trophy” to Dr Hassan Al Nama, well-known Qatari poet, writer and diplomat. Al Sulaiti said, Dr Nama was selected for the

award in view of his valued con-tributions to culture, knowledge and literature.

Nama in his speech lauded the great efforts being made by Katara in promoting Qatari culture, art and literature.

“I think it is really a good opportunity to celebrate the opening of the Katara Pub-lishing House. It will create a real channel between our

heritage and world heritage, art and literature,” Al Nama later said, when asked for his comments.

Al Nama said he was “very happy and proud” to receive Katara’s first award for the best Qatari writer.

After the ceremony, Al Sulaiti cut the ribbon to open the Katara Publishing House in the presence of the participating

dignitaries. Five new books published by Katara Publishing House were released on the occasion.

Katara Publishing House has so far published about 100 books, including 60 novels in Arabic, English and French and several books in Arabic on topics such as pearl diving, Oud, falconry, pigeons, dhows, Arab art, novel and literature.

Minister of Energy and Industry H E Dr Mohammed bin Saleh Al Sada; Minister of State H E Dr Hamad bin Abdul Aziz Al Kawari; Dr Khalid bin Ibrahim Al Sulaiti, General Manager of Katara Cultural Village and Qatari poet and writer, Dr Hassan Al Nama, during the opening of Katara Publishing House at Katara Cultural Village.

Carnegie Mellon Qatar welcomes new students THE PENINSULA

DOHA: Carnegie Mellon University in Qatar (CMU-Q) welcomed newly admitted students to the Marhaba Tartans evening, an event where the students can explore the academic programmes and student experience opportunities at CMU-Q.

More than 100 admitted students and their families met their future professors and classmates, as well as the staff members who will support them in their educational journey, a statement issued by CMU-Q said.

Michael Trick, Dean of CMU-Q, wel-comed the Class of 2022.

“Students, university is a trans-formative experience. You are starting on a journey where you will meet new, lifelong friends, learn new interests and passions, and build the foundation of careers where you can make a difference,” Michael Trick said.

Each of CMU-Q’s academic degree pro-grammes offered “Explore Your Major” ses-sions, followed by a scavenger hunt designed to familiarise students with life on CMU-Q’s campus.

Michael Trick, Dean of CMU-Q, with a student, during the ceremony to welcome new students.

Qatar discusses Comprehensive Air-Services Agreement with EU THE PENINSULA

DOHA: The Comprehensive Air-Services Agreement with the EU was on the top of the agenda of Fourth Consultative Meeting held between Qatar and the European Union (EU) on Thursday.

The negotiations round of 4th Consultative Meeting in air transport field lasted for two days, from April 18 to 19.

The delegation of Qatar was headed by Abdulla bin Nasser Turki Al Subaey, Chairman of Civil Aviation Authority. The delegation also included repre-sentatives of Qatar Airways, headed by Akbar Al Baker, CEO of Qatar Airways Group, as well

as a number of specialists and experts in various fields of civil aviation.

The European delegation was headed by Carlos Acosta, Director of Air Transport Inter-national Relations in the European Union, as well as

several representatives of the European Union countries and representatives of European Air-lines, in order to discuss com-prehensive air services agreement with the EU countries.

Such an agreement organises all aspects of air services and air transport rights that relate Qatar with EU coun-tries. Such rights were previ-ously discussed during the pre-vious rounds between the two parties, said a statement.

The meeting also discussed the most important topics related to aviation safety, nav-igation, environment and avi-ation security in Qatar and the European Union.

Abdulla bin Nasser Turki Al Subaey, Chairman of Civil Aviation Authority; Akbar Al Baker, CEO of Qatar Airways Group; and other members of Qatar delegation with the European delegation, headed by Carlos Acosta, Director of Air Transport International Relations in the European Union, during the Fourth Consultative Meeting between Qatar and EU on Thursday.

The meeting also discussed the most important topics related to aviation safety, navigation, environment and aviation security in Qatar and the European Union.

Secretary-General of Foreign Ministry meets Indian official QNA

NEW DELHI: Secretary-General of the Foreign Ministry, H E Dr Ahmed bin Hassan Al Hammadi, met yesterday with the Secretary of the Indian Ministry of External Affairs, T S Tiru-murti, during his visit to India.

The meeting reviewed bilateral relations, ways of boosting them and enhancing prospects for cooperation, in addition to issues of common concern.

QNA

DOHA: Emir H H Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani sent a cable of congratula-tions to the President of Cuba, Miguel Diaz-Canel, on his election to the post.

Deputy Emir H H Sheikh Abdullah bin Hamad Al Thani and Prime Minister and Interior Minister H E Sheikh Abdullah bin Nasser bin Khalifa Al Thani also sent similar messages to the new President.

Emir greets new Cuban President

Katara Publishing House has so far published about 100 books, including 60 novels in Arabic, English and French and several books in Arabic on topics such as pearl diving, Oud, falconry, pigeons, dhows, Arab art, novel and literature.

QNA

DOHA: Weather inshore until 6pm today will witness some scattered clouds at times, the Department of Meteorology said in its daily weather report.

Offshore, will be fine with some clouds. Wind inshore will be north-easterly to southeasterly 05 to 10 knot.

Offshore, it will be northeasterly to southeasterly 04 to 12 knot. Visibility will be 4km to 8km. Sea state inshore 1-2FT, while offshore 1-3 FT rises at 4 FT at places at times.

Mild winds likely today: Department of Meteorology

03SATURDAY 21 APRIL 2018 HOME / MIDDLE EAST

Qatari Economic Tour expo begins in Raleigh

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1

The booklet is issued on a regular basis, which will facil-itate the American and other foreign investors in general to identify the investment envi-ronment in Qatar and the available opportunities, incen-tives and tax exemptions and laws and regulations which promote the entry of foreign investment in Qatar.

Director of International Cooperation, Economic and Trade Agreements Department at the Ministry of Economy and Commerce, Ahmed Ahen, said that a comprehensive guide will be issued in cooperation with the US-Qatar Business Council, Qatar Chamber, the Qatari Busi-nessmen Association and private and government institutions related to this issue, and it will be available on a special website aiming at facilitating the estab-lishment of business in Qatar and present ing investment

opportunities for foreign and American investors in particular.

During the session, Executive Director of the US-Qatari Business Council Mohamed Barakat, presented the Council and its establishment since 1996 with the aim of enhancing trade exchange between the two coun-tries and enhancing cooperation between Qatari and US com-panies, adding that the Council is currently researching and developing its work to keep abreast of the great progress in the strategic relationship between Qatar and the US.

Barakat added that Qatari companies are always looking to understand the US market and important issues in investment and trade and how to deal with issues such as letters of credit and how to send goods and products to Qatar, explaining that the Business Council is working always on how to provide services and facilitate trade

exchange between companies at all levels, whether small, medium or large companies.

He pointed out that there is cooperation with US and gov-ernment institutions to remove any obstacles that can face US companies to work in the Qatari market or establish partnerships with national institutions, and facilitate the issuance of licenses and some of them go on special missions at the expense of the US

government to promote trade and increase income, which in turn is reflected positively on the government and increase the tax return.

The Executive Director of the US-Qatari Business Council explained that, through the eco-nomic tour and meeting with the delegation members, he learned more about issues of interest to Qatari businessmen and investors, most of which are

focused on knowing the investment climate, such as taxes that vary from one city to another, and from one state to another, and identifying some specialized institutions that encourage investment in US, helping foreign investors to overcome tax obstacles for the private sector, and it links investors to the government and informs them about all tax exemptions for foreign investors.

Officials during a discussion organised by the Ministry of Economy and Commerce, in cooperation with US-Qatar Business Council in Raleigh, North Carolina, during the ministry’s tour in the United States.

President of Sierra Leone arrives today QNA

DOHA: The President of the Republic of Sierra Leone, Julius Maada Bio, arrives today in Doha on an official visit.

Emir H H Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani will meet at the Emiri Diwan tomorrow with the President of Sierra Leone, where they will discuss enhancing bilateral relations, ways to develop bilateral cooperation, as well as a number of issues of common interest.

HRW denounces eviction of Syrian refugees in LebanonAFP

BEIRUT: Human Rights Watch yesterday criticised Lebanese municipalities for what it called the unjustifiable expulsion of hundreds of Syrians from their homes since 2016, as sentiment against refugees simmers.

“At least 13 municipalities in Lebanon have forcibly evicted at least 3,664 Syrian refugees from their homes and expelled them from the municipalities, appar-ently because of their nationality or religion,” from the start of 2016 through to the end of March this year, the New York-based rights group said.

Almost one million Syrians are registered as refugees in Lebanon, though many expect the real number is much higher.

The Mediterranean country’s population stood at just four million before neighbouring Syria’s civil war broke out in 2011, sending tens of thousands of Syrians fleeing across the border in search of safety.

Several politicians have blamed a flurry of social and eco-nomic woes in Lebanon on Syrian refugees, and calls for them to return have increased in the run-up to the country’s first parliamentary elections in nearly a decade on May 6.

“Municipalities have no legitimate justification for for-cibly evicting Syrian refugees if it amounts to nationality-based or religious discrimination,” said Bill Frelick, Refugee Rights Director at Human Rights Watch.

“Lebanese leaders should curb rhetoric that encourages or condones forced evictions, expulsions, and other discrimi-natory and harassing treatment of refugees in Lebanon,” Frelick said. The evictions have caused refugees to lose income and property, and their children to miss school or drop out alto-gether, according to HRW, which spoke to 57 Syrians affected by

the measures. Some municipalities have

claimed the evictions were based on housing regulation infractions such as tenants not registering their leases with them, HRW said.

But despite “widespread breaches by Lebanese citizens as well, the measures these municipalities have taken have been directed exclusively at Syrian nationals and not Leb-anese citizens”, it said.

HRW also pointed to dis-crimination on a religious basis, with most of the municipalities involved in forcibly evicting and expelling Syrian refugees pre-dominantly populated by

Christians. All 57 interviewees who spoke to HRW identified as Muslim.

But, said HRW, “Lebanon’s refugee-hosting fatigue has been exacerbated by a lack of inter-national support” as well.

On Wednesday, around 500 Syrian refugees left southern Lebanon under an agreement between authorities in Beirut and Damascus to return them to their home country.

The UN refugee agency (UNHCR) said it was aware of the returns but was not involved in the agreement, “considering the prevailing humanitarian and security situation in Syria”.

Lebanon’s Foreign Ministry accused UNHCR of “scaring the displaced from any return at this stage because of what it sees as an unstable security situation”.

It criticised the UN agency’s “renewed determination to refuse any positive signs for a return... despite the security sit-uation in many Syrian towns cur-rently being stable.”

The ministry said this had led it to “re-evaluate” and “question” the UN agency’s work.

Syria’s war has killed more than 350,000 people and dis-placed millions since starting in 2011 with the brutal repression of anti-government protests.

Gulf War: Iraq resumes paying Kuwait compensation REUTERS

BAGHDAD: Iraq resumed paying Kuwait compensation yesterday for the destruction of Kuwaiti oil fields and facil-ities during the 1990-91 Gulf War, the United Nations said in Geneva in a prepared statement.

The payment had been suspended since October 2014 because of security and budgetary problems the Iraqi government in its fight against Islamic State.

“The United Nations Compensation Commission (UNCC) made available $90m to the Government of the State of Kuwait,” the UN said. “With today’s payment, the Commission has paid out $47.9bn, leaving approxi-mately $4.5bn remaining to be paid to the only out-standing claim.”

The sum owed, as well as the $90m payment, goes towards an overall claim of $14.7bn in damages by the Kuwait Petroleum Corpo-ration, the largest approved by the Geneva-based com-mission, set up by the UN Security Council in 1991.

Payouts are made quar-terly as funds become available.

The UNCC said in November that Baghdad should finish paying by the end of 2021 compensation for damages to states, companies and individuals caused by Iraq’s invasion and seven-month occupation of Kuwait under former president Saddam Hussein.

Kuwait and Iraq agreed last year that payments would gradually increase from 0.5 percent of Iraqi oil proceeds in 2018 to 1.5 percent in 2019 and 3 percent in both 2020 and 2021. Iraq declared victory over Islamic State in December, five months after Iraqi forces backed by a US-led coalition captured the militants’ capital in the northern city of Mosul.

Turkish Prime Minister Binali Yildirim (right) and Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) leader Devlet Bahceli talk during a vote on snap elections in the Turkish Parliament in Ankara, yesterday.

Parliament ratifies bill on early elections in TurkeyANATOLIA

ANKARA: The parliament yesterday ratified the bill calling for early elections in Turkey on June 24, with lawmakers from ruling and opposition parties supporting the move.

A total of 386 lawmakers from the ruling Justice and Devel-opment (AK) Party, main oppo-sition Republican People’s Party (CHP) and opposition Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) voted in favour of the bill.

Speaking to lawmakers in the General Assembly, Prime Min-ister Binali Yildirim said: “I feel honoured to be the last prime minister of the Turkish Republic.” Yildirim rejected claims the elec-tions were being held too soon.

“Political parties both in power and opposition should be ready for early elections at any

moment,” he said. The Prime Minister said AK Party’s presi-dential nominee is “our President Recep Tayyip Erdogan”, “the man of the nation”. MHP Deputy Group Chairman said June 24 will reflect the country’s national will.

Erkan Akcay said the parlia-ment’s decision for early elec-tions is “a snap for those who are annoyed with Turkey’s Operation Olive Branch, Operation Euphrates Shield and Al Bab operation”. Akcay said: “This decision is a snap for those who get annoyed with fighting against FETO and PKK.”

Turkey on January 20 launched Operation Olive Branch to remove YPG/PKK and Daesh terrorists from Syria’s north-western Afrin. On March 18, Turkish troops and Free Syrian Army liberated the Afrin district centre.

Qatar a rising star location for business meetingsCONTINUED FROM PAGE 1

In Qatar, business events have seen an average annual growth rate of 36 percent over the past five years. “Qatar is taking steady steps towards posi-tioning the country as an attractive destination for business events in the region by capitalising on its easy access, growing event management services, and expanded exhi-bition capacity and transport network,” says Ahmed Al Obaidli, Director of Exhibitions, Qatar Tourism Authority (QTA) according to South China Morning Post.

He says the authority is

focusing on attracting MICE events that match Qatar’s existing growth sectors, thus cre-ating a more enriching MICE experience for business visitors while making significant contri-butions to the country’s economy and intellectual landscapes.

“We realise that Qatar is an emerging MICE destination and so, we are currently in the awareness-building phase. To generate interest, we regularly participate at the world’s leading trade shows as well as invite buyers and media to experience Qatar’s tourism and MICE offerings first-hand while helping to shape our country’s offerings through their meetings

with local stakeholders,” Al Obaidli says. “While we have been mostly focused on Europe and the US, new markets we are keen on in 2018 include China and India. And, looking ahead to 2019, we are looking to further develop incentive and corporate meetings offerings,” he adds.

According to Al Obaidli, Qatar offers a wide range of authentic experiences, including museums, galleries, public art installations, archaeological sites, forts and towers in addition to a variety of city and desert tours. “Depending on how much time the visiting MICE groups have to spend, they have the option of quick Doha

city discovery tours aboard a hop-on-hop-off bus or 45 minutes in a helicopter,” he says. “Those opting to experience the country’s seafaring heritage can cruise the city’s shoreline aboard a traditional wooden Qatari dhow boat.”

Qatar has some of the world’s most sophisticated con-vention and exhibition facilities. The Qatar National Convention Centre (QNCC) features a multi-purpose 4,000-seat conference hall, 2,300-seat theatre, and three auditoria and a number of meeting spaces. The centre offers 40,000 square metres of column-free exhibition space over nine halls, which can

provide seating for up to 10,000 delegates.

Doha Exhibition and Con-vention Center (DECC) is located in the centre of Doha’s com-mercial district. Opened in 2015, it covers an area of 90,000 square metres to include five vast, pillarless halls, capable of seating over 34,000 visitors. Its 18-metre-high ceiling is the highest in the Middle East.

Qatar’s rich cultural and her-itage sites also provide unique venues for business events. These include the Museum of Islamic Art, Msheireb and Katara Cultural Village which are equipped with state-of-the-art meetings facilities.

04 SATURDAY 21 APRIL 2018MIDDLE EAST / AFRICA

Israeli troops shoot dead four PalestiniansREUTERS

GAZA: Israeli troops shot dead four Palestinians on the Gaza-Israel border yesterday, bringing to 35 the death toll in recent weeks among Palestinian protesters demanding the right to return to their former homeland.

Gazans used catapults and sling-shots to launch stones at Israeli forces, and some Pales-tinians brought wire-cutters to cut through the border fence, ignoring leaflets dropped by the Israeli military warning resi-dents not to approach the frontier. The deaths included a 15-year-old boy shot dead in northern Gaza, Palestinian health officials said, adding that 156 people were wounded by Israeli gunfire.

UN Middle East envoy Nickolay Mladenov wrote on Twitter: “It is outrageous to shoot at children! How does the killing of a child in Gaza today help peace? It doesn’t! It fuels anger and breeds more killing. Children must be protected from violence, not exposed to it.”

In response, a retired former Israeli army spokesman, Peter Lerner, tweeted suggestions to

Mladenov, including: “Please go to Gaza, engage Hamas and get them to stop sending people to the fence.”

The planned six-week protest campaign reached its half-way point yesterday, which saw smaller crowds than in recent weeks. As the numbers peaked during the afternoon Israeli soldiers called out warnings in Arabic over loud-speakers to anyone who approached the border fence.

Black plumes of smoke from piles of burning tyres bil-lowed over the area, and stretcher-bearers rushed to carry the wounded to first aid posts. The protest began on March 30, and has seen tent encampments spring up near the Israeli-imposed restricted zone along the 40km (25-mile) border fence. The protesters have revived demands for Pal-estinian refugees to regain their ancestral homes in what is now

Israel. The protests are scheduled to culminate on May 15, when, according to Hamas leader Ismail Haniyah, the Gaza scenes would be replicated else-where on Israel’s frontiers.

“I say to our people every-where, be prepared for a human deluge on all of the borders of Pal-estine, inside the occupied land and outside the occupied land,” he said on a visit to one of the border camps. “I say to the (Israeli occupiers) your time is gone.”

Israel’s use of live fire has drawn international criticism but the Israeli government says it is protecting its borders and takes such action when pro-testers come too close to the border fence. The Israeli mil-itary said that around 3,000 Pal-estinians were involved in the latest protest, and that its troops responded “with riot dispersal means and are firing in accordance with the rules of engagement.”

The deaths that included a 15-year-old boy who was shot dead in northern Gaza, brought 35 the toll in recent weeks among Palestinian protesters demanding the right to return to their former homeland.

Israel accuses Hamas, the Islamist group which rules Gaza, of staging riots and trying to carry out attacks. Hamas denies this. Although organisers say the main protest is intended to be peaceful, some protesters have advanced toward the border from the encampments to hurl stones and burning tyres near the fence.

Yesterday, they fitted kites with cans of flammable liquid, which they flew across the border to start fires in Israel.

“We aim to distract the sol-diers from shooting and wounding or killing our people,” said Mohammad Abu Mustafa, 17,

who lost his right leg a few months ago after being shot by an Israeli soldier.

Israel’s Foreign Ministry tweeted a photograph of one kite daubed with a swastika flying through the sky trailing flames.

More than 2 million Pales-tinians are packed into the narrow coastal enclave. Israel withdrew its troops and settlers from Gaza in 2005 but maintains tight control of its land and sea borders. Egypt also restricts movement in and out of Gaza on its border. The protest campaign, dubbed The Great March of Return, is leading up to May 15,

when Palestinians mark Nakba Day, or the Day of Catastrophe, commemorating their dis-placement around the time of Israel’s founding in 1948.

It takes place at a time of growing frustration over the prospects for an independent Pal-estinian state. Peace talks between Israel and the Pales-tinians have been stalled for several years and Israeli settle-ments in the occupied territories have expanded. US President Donald Trump’s decision last year to recognise disputed Jerusalem as Israel’s capital further fueled Palestinian anger.

Handcarts carrying empty jerrycans are parked as they wait to be filled with water in Athi River, on the outskirts of Nairobi, Kenya, yesterday.

A Syrian rebel fighter helps carry belongings for a woman evacuated from the town of Dumayr, east of the capital Damascus, after arriving in the city of Azaz in the northern countryside of Aleppo, yesterday.

Palestinians clash with Israeli forces in response to Israeli soldiers’ intervention as part of the “Great March of Return” demonstration in Khan Yunis, Gaza, yesterday.

Minister’s ouster unlikely to slow Sudan’s push to get off US ‘terror’ listKHARTOUM: President Omar Hassan Al Bashir’s dismissal of Sudan’s foreign minister, Khartoum’s top negotiator with Wash-ington, is unlikely to affect efforts to have Khartoum removed from a US “terrorism” blacklist, experts say.

On Thursday, Bashir sacked Ibrahim Ghandour, who headed negotiations with Washington that in October helped lift a decades-old US trade embargo on Khartoum. His dismissal comes amid an economic crisis in the African country and his replacement, who has yet to be named, is set to inherit a complicated case load.

Ghandour, the first official to publicly raise concerns over Sudan’s economic crisis, was fired a day after he said in parliament that Sudanese diplomats abroad had not been paid in months.

But analysts say his sacking is not expected to derail ties between Khartoum and Washington, which have warmed since the sanctions were lifted. “Ghandour’s loss will be felt, but his going won’t change Khartoum’s policy direction,” Magnus Taylor, Sudan analyst at the International Crisis Group, said.

By dismissing Ghandour, Khartoum is not changing its “mod-erate” policy towards Washington, he said. “Generally, Sudanese are focused on getting themselves out of the SSTL,” Taylor said, referring to Washington’s State Sponsors of Terrorism List.

Although Washington lifted sanctions imposed in 1997 over Khartoum’s alleged support of Islamist militant groups, it has kept Sudan on the blacklist along with Iran, Syria and North Korea.

Al Qaeda founder Osama bin Laden lived in Sudan between 1992 and 1996.

2 Cameroon soldiers dead in blastYAOUNDE: Two Cameroonian soldiers died and four were seri-ously injured yesterday after a mine exploded in an anglophone region hit by violence between separatists and the government.

“A Cameroonian army vehicle went over a mine” in Eyumedjock, a town in an English-speaking part of the southwest, a security source said. The source said the blast close to the Nigerian border caused “two deaths and four serious injuries”.

Eyumedjock lies between Mamfe, the main town of the Manyu, and Ekok “in an epicentre of violence in the southwestern Anglo-phone region,” the source added.

Since late 2017, anglophone separatists have killed 30 members of the security forces, according to an AFP count based on official statements and including the two deaths on Friday. Other observers in Yaounde believe the toll is higher. Northwest and southwest Cameroon are home to the English-speaking inhabitants of Cam-eroon, who make up 20 percent of the population.

Assad forces begin attacks to retake areas in HomsANATOLIA

HOMS: The Syrian regime has launched fresh military operations in opposition-held parts of the northern Homs province.

According to information gathered by Anadolu Agency cor-respondents in Syria, regime forces have launched fresh assaults since Monday against rebel-held areas of northern Homs. Syria’s armed opposition retook some strategic positions that were previously captured by the Bashar al-Assad regime.

Under Russian mediation, a short-term ceasefire was announced that will expire on April 22. Roughly 250,000 people living in a 592-square-kilometer area have remined under a blockade by the Syrian regime for five years.

Meanwhile, the regime also intensified attacks in the Yarmouk Camp, which is controlled by Daesh.

The regime recently managed to seize the Damascus suburb of Eastern Ghouta -- one of the opposition’s last strongholds on the capital’s outskirts -- following sustained attacks and a five-year blockade.

Humanitarian access to the area, which is home to 400,000 people, had been completely cut off.

Over the past eight months, regime forces had intensified their siege, making it nearly impossible for food or medicine to get into the district and leaving thousands of civilians in need of assistance.

US ‘bombed’ UN peace talks on Syria: LavrovAFP

MOSCOW: The United States and its allies “bombed” UN-backed peace talks aimed at ending the war in Syria when they ordered strikes on the country this month, Russia’s foreign minister said yesterday.

The US, France and Britain “on 14 April bombed not only made-up chemical sites in Syria, but also bombed the (UN-backed peace) talks in Geneva,” Sergei Lavrov said following a meeting in Moscow with UN envoy Staffan de Mistura.

“We came very close to a relaunching of the Geneva process with a real dialogue between Syrians, mainly on the question of constitutional reform,” Lavrov added.

De Mistura, who also met Russian defence minister Sergei Shoigu, said the UN’s priority was to “lower the temperature” following the strikes.

“I’m very pleased to hear... that in spite of what happened last week and it is still very recent, there is a strong com-mitment from the Russian Federation to push for the

political process,” he said. “It is important we turn the

page on this alleged chemical attack because we need to go back to the basics,” he added.

The US France and Britain carried out air strikes on what they said were Assad’s chemical weapons installations in response to an alleged chemical weapon attack.

Moscow, an ally of the Syrian regime, has long claimed an alleged attack in Douma was “staged” by Syrian rebels and the civil defence organisation, the White Helmets.

27 killed in gang violence in NigeriaKANO: A fresh outbreak of gang violence in northern Nigeria has left at least 27 people dead, locals said yesterday, highlighting the volatile security situation in West Africa’s largest economy.

On Thursday suspected cattle thieves launched reprisal attacks on two villages in northern Nigeria’s Zamfara state, where security forces are battling to contain cattle-rustling gangs.

Gunmen on motorcycles attacked neighbouring Kabaro and Danmami villages in Maru district. “Twenty people were killed in Kabaro and seven others were also shot dead in Danmami,” Kabaro resident Lawwali Usmanu said. “We buried them this morning before the Friday prayers,” said Usmanu, who attended the funeral of the victims. “The perpetrators are the same cattle thieves that have been terrorising us for years, stealing our cattle and abducting people for ransom,” said another resident Bubr Murtala.

The attack came after villagers had mobbed and killed a member of the cattle rustling gang, according to Usmanu.

Residents of the two villages had armed themselves with locally made guns to fight against the cattle rustlers who had superior weapons. “All we have for defence are muskets but the bandits use modern firearms,” Murtala said.Al Qaeda-linked group claims

attack on UN camp at TimbuktuAFP

NOUAKCHOTT: The main jihadist alliance in Africa’s Sahel region with links to Al Qaeda yesterday claimed an attack last weekend on the UN camp of international troops in northern Mali’s historic city of Timbuktu.

One UN peacekeeper from Burkina Faso was killed in the rocket, mortar and car bomb attack, while fourteen UN and French soldiers along with two civilians were wounded.

Around 15 of the attackers were killed, according to the

French military. The United Nations said it marked the biggest single attack on its peacekeepers since they were deployed to Mali in July 2013.

The jihadist alliance’s claim to have carried out the oper-ation was revealed in a statement posted on social net-works and also received by the Mauritanian agency ANI and the US jihadist monitoring SITE intelligence group. It said the attack was launched to avenge raids by French forces earlier this month in which several of its members were killed.

Waiting for water

05SATURDAY 21 APRIL 2018 ASIA

India’s opposition moves to impeach chief justiceIANS

NEW DELHI: In an unprece-dented move, 64 members of the Rajya Sabha belonging to seven parties led by the Congress yesterday submitted an impeachment motion for the removal of Chief Justice Dipak Misra on five grounds of “misbe-haviour”.

“We have met Rajya Sabha Chairman (M Venkaiah Naidu) at his residence. We have moved a motion of impeachment for the removal of CJI under five listed grounds of misbehaviour. We have sought his removal under Articles 217 read with Article 124 (4) of the Constitution of India,” Leader of Opposition in Rajya Sabha Ghulam Nabi Azad said.

The opposition move came a day after a Supreme Court bench headed by Chief Justice Misra rejected a PIL for a SIT probe into death of CBI court

judge B H Loya, who was con-ducting a trial in the killing of gangster Sohrabuddin Sheikh in Gujarat in which now BJP Pres-ident Amit Shah was an accused.

Asked about the timing of the motion, Azad said they had sought an appointment with Naidu a week ago but were told that he was away on a tour of the northeast. “If he was available then, we would have submitted the motion then,” he said, dis-missing any link with Thursday’s verdict. “Anyhow the move was initiated a month ago and most signatures were more than 20 days old.”

Azad told the media that the motion was signed by 71 MPs from seven political parties. “We have told the Chairman that seven of the members have, meanwhile, retired and those signatures should be counted out.”

Besides the Congress, those who signed the motion include

members of the Samajwadi Party, BSP, CPI-M, CPI, NCP and IUML. Nominated member KTS Tulsi also signed.

This is the first time an impeachment of a Chief Justice is being sought to be made in Parliament. The first case of impeachment of a Supreme Court judge, Justice V Ram-aswamy, was voted out in the Lok Sabha in the mid-90s. In two other cases, Justice P D

Dinakaran of the Sikkim High Court and Justice Soumitra Sen of Calcutta High Court resigned before the impeachment motion could be voted. An impeachment motion has to be passed by both the Houses of Parliament with a special two-thirds majority.

The motion lists five charges of misbehaviour including an alleged conspiracy to pay illegal gratification in a case relating to an educational trust and the manner in which the CJI had dealt with the case by denying permission to the CBI to register an FIR against a judge of the Alla-habad High Court when the CBI s h a r e d i n c r i m i n a t i n g information.

The second related to the CJI having dealt with the trust case on the administrative side and the third related to alleged ante-dating of a matter “which is a very serious charge”.

The fourth charge related to the CJI having acquired land when he was an advocate by allegedly giving a false affidavit. The allotment of the land was cancelled by an Additional Dis-trict Magistrate in 1985. The CJI surrendered the land in 2012 after he was elevated to the Supreme Court.

The fifth charge related to alleged abuse of exercise of power by CJI in choosing to send sensitive matters to particular benches by misusing his authority as “Master of the Roster” with the likely intent to influence the outcome.

Asked why members of other opposition parties had not signed the motion, former Law Minister Kapil Sibal said the motion was not moved by political parties but by individual members.

“Don’t make it political. There is no political motivation behind it. Some people’s matters

are on (before courts) and we do not want to embarrass them,” he said.

Asked about reports that former Prime Minister Man-mohan Singh was not enthusi-astic about the move and had not signed the motion, Sibal said: “They are absolutely false. They are not true. It is not a small issue. It is not instant coffee. It is about Constitution and a matter of institution. We did not want to involve him because he is a former Prime Minister.”

He said the motion does not refer to the Supreme Court judgement in the Loya case. Impeachment can be done only on some actions of a judge amounting to misbehaviour and not for judgements which could be right or wrong.

“The impeachment is under constitution. The Loya judgement cannot come under articles of charge.”

South Korea’s Ambassador to India Shin Bong-kil (secon left), his wife Mee Sook Hwang (centre) and Counsel General of Mumbai Soung Eun Klm during the inauguration of the South Korean Consulate General Office in Hyderabad, yesterday.

South Korean Consulate opens in Hyderabad

Patiya massacre: Gujarat High Court acquits former ministerIANS

GANDHINAGAR: A Division Bench of the Gujarat High Court yesterday acquitted former BJP Minister Maya Kodnani, saying there was absence of sufficient proof of her presence at the crime scene in the Naroda Patiya massacre case of 2002.

The court also upheld the conviction of Bajrangi Dal activist Babu Bajrangi, who was sentenced to imprisonment for life by the trial court.

The Bharatiya Janata Party Minister was one of the key accused in the riot case and was convicted by a special SIT court in August 2012. She was sen-tenced to 28 years in imprisonment.

The judgment was pro-nounced on the appeals filed by the former BJP Minister and others against their conviction by the SIT court.

The Division Bench of Justice Harsha Devani and Justice A S Supehia upheld the conviction by the special court of Babubhai Patel alias Bajrangi, a prominent leader of the Bajrang Dal Hindu outfit.

He was a key conspirator in the massacre in Naroda Patiya area, where 97 Muslim persons were killed in the Godhra aftermath.

The Naroda Patiya riots was one of the worst incidents during communal conflagration that engulfed Gujarat, following the train burning incident on February 27, 2002, at Godhra in which 59 Kar Sevaks were killed.

The High Court in August 2017 had reserved its order after the hearing concluded against the judgment of the special court.

The special court had sen-tenced 32 people, including Kodnani and Bajrangi. Seven others were given enhanced life imprisonment of 21 years, which they will serve after undergoing 10 years’ impris-onment under IPC section 326 (causing grievous hurt).

The remaining accused were given simple life impris-onment of 14 years.

The trial court’s acquittal of 29 other accused in the case, for want of evidence was chal-lenged by the SIT, even as those convicted had challenged the lower court’s order in the High Court for respite.

Government counsel Prashant Desai said: “It is clear from the Gujarat High Court’s judgment that the court has gone on no witness theory.”

“Twelve accused have been convicted. Besides Babu Bajrangi, Prakash Rathod and Suresh Chara alias Suresh Langda have been convicted under the IPC 120 (B) as key conspirators.

“The sting operation by the Tehelka was not taken into account by the court. The 12 have been convicted with 21 years imprisonment without remission.

“Whatever Babu Bajrangi did was no different from what the others did, so his conviction was on parity. Court believed police witnesses.”

BJP wins all 5 municipal corporations in JharkhandIANS

RANCHI: The ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in Jharkhand won all the five municipal corporations and registered thumping victories in Nagar Parishad and Nagar Panchayat polls, officials said.

The BJP won all the five municipal corporations, Mayor and Deputy Mayor posts. The polling took place for the five municipal corpo-rations of Ranchi, Medni-nagar, Adityapur, Hazaribagh and Giridih.

Jharkhand Chief Minister Raghubar Das said: “It’s a victory of the BJP workers. This is a victory of devel-opment. We congratulate people of the state for the victory.”

Sri Lanka beefs up tourist hotspot securityAFP

COLOMBO: Sri Lanka announced yesterday it would establish new police posts and step up patrols at popular resorts after a spate of sexual attacks and violence targeting foreign tourists.

Police chief Pujith Jayasundara said 20 new sta-tions would be established at holiday hotspots to protect vis-itors from touts and criminals, despite concerns his force was

already overstretched.“I wish we had more men and

resources for this job, but we are making adjustments to our deployments to ensure better pro-ductivity,” Jayasundara said.

He added the measures were decided after a Dutch tourist was sexually harassed and several other tourists were assaulted by a gang at a hotel in the southern resort town of Mirissa last week.

Five other tourists were beaten up in the same area this

week and 14 men have been arrested over the two incidents, police said.

Local media reports have cat-alogued several sexual har-assment complaints by foreign tourists, with many reluctant to make official complaints for fear of drawn-out court proceedings.

Tourism Minister John Ama-ratunga appealed to victims to come forward and promised to cover the expenses of those who return to the island to help identify

perpetrators. The US State Department warned last year that sexual crimes against women were on the rise in Sri Lanka.

“Incidents have also occurred at tourist beaches and smaller hotels in the Southern province,” the travel advisory noted.

In 2014, a Sri Lankan court sentenced a local politician and three of his supporters to 20 years in jail for the 2011 murder of British tourist Khuram Shaikh.

Nepali workers try to bring a Malaysian airliner back onto the runway at the international airport in Kathmandu after it skidded off the runway following an aborted take-off.

Jet skids off runway causing Kathmandu airport chaosAFP

KATHMANDU: A Malaysian jet carrying 139 people that aborted its takeoff and skidded into mud forced Kathmandu airport to shut down for more than 12 hours causing flight chaos yesterday after the latest near miss on the city’s notoriously dangerous runway.

Nobody was hurt in the incident but hundreds of pas-sengers had flights out of the Nepalese capital cancelled and all incoming flights were diverted after the Malindo Air-lines Boeing 737 went off the runway late on Thursday.

The jet was speeding down the Tribhuvan International Airport runway when the pilots detected a problem and aborted takeoff, airport spokesman

Prem Nath Thakur said.The jet skidded into grass

and came to a halt in mud about 100 feet from the runway at the airport which had a major crash last month.

“All aboard are safe,” Thakur said, adding that the cause of the cockpit alert was not immedi-ately known.

Nepal’s only international airport reopened again just before midday Friday after the jet was “removed without any damage,” Thakur added.

More than 100 people were needed to move the jet, its tyres stuck in grass that had been turned into a soggy morass by recent rainfall.

Tow tractors pulled the jet out of the mud up ramps set up in front of the tyres.

American traveller Sarah

Ann Loreth, heading to Doha before returning to her home in Boston, spent hours on her delayed jet after the emergency.

“We were supposed to take off on Thursday but couldn’t because of the Malaysia flight,” she said.

“Around 2am the flight attendant informed us the other flight had slipped off the runway and was stuck in the mud and could not be moved.

“They deplaned us around 2:30am and it was pure chaos. We went back to the terminal and they had our bags laid out behind the counter and we just went behind and grabbed them.” Cars eventually took the passengers to hotels to wait for a reorganised flight, Loreth said.

Myanmar police ordered set up of scribes: TestimonyAFP

YANGON: A Myanmar police chief ordered officers to set up a Reuters reporter by handing over sensitive docu-ments to him in a sting oper-ation that also ensnared his colleague, a police official told a court yesterday.

Reporters Wa Lone, 32 and Kyaw Soe Oo, 28 were detained in December after meeting police for dinner in Yangon and accused of vio-lating the country’s Official Secrets Act for possessing material relating to operations in conflict-hit Rakhine state.

Deputy police major Moe Yan Naing said yesterday that he had been questioned about meeting Wa Lone in November and that his superior then set up a sting.

Besides the Congress, those who signed the impeachment motion include members of the Samajwadi Party, BSP, CPI-M, CPI, NCP and IUML. Nominated member KTS Tulsi also signed.

06 SATURDAY 21 APRIL 2018ASIA

China, Australia vessels in South China Sea ‘encounter’REUTERS

B E I J I N G / M E L B O U R N E : Chinese and Australian naval vessels had an “encounter” in the South China Sea this week, and China acted professionally and lawfully, its defence ministry said, rejecting reports China challenged Australian warships.

The Australian Defence Department confirmed three ships had recently travelled to Ho Chi Minh City in Vietnam but declined to comment on “operational details related to ships transiting the South China Sea”.

The Australian Broadcasting Corp cited one official saying the exchanges with the Chinese navy were polite but “robust”.

China’s Defence Ministry said in a statement the reports in Australian media “did not accord with the facts”.

“The Chinese side’s ships used professional language to communicate with the Aus-tralian side, and their operations were lawful, in compliance, pro-fessional and safe,” it said.

The “encounter” happened on Sunday, it said.

China recently completed extensive military exercises in the South China Sea, where its claims are hotly disputed by Vietnam as well as the Philip-pines, Malaysia and Brunei. Taiwan also lays claim to most of the sea.

Earlier, Australia’s Defence Department said in a statement that its forces had “maintained a robust programme of

international engagement with countries in and around the South China Sea for decades”.

“As they have done for many decades, Australian vessels and aircraft will continue to exercise rights under international law to freedom of navigation and overflight, including in the South China Sea,” the Defence Department said.

Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull, in London for a Commonwealth Heads of Gov-ernment meeting, declined to confirm the interaction between the Australian warships and the Chinese military, Fairfax media reported.

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying told a daily news briefing China’s consistent position was to support and actively safeguard the right of all countries to have freedom of navigation and overflight in the South China Sea, in

accordance with international law.

“If Australia is referring to freedom of navigation in accordance with international laws, there is no problem whatsoever,” Hua said in Beijing.

“But if Australia has other motives, we hope it can see the trend in the South China Sea is stable and improving, and work together with China and other neighbouring countries for the peace and stability of the region.”

China’s construction of islands and military facilities in the South China Sea, through which some $3 trillion in trade passes annually, has sparked concern it is seeking to restrict free movement and extend its strategic reach.

The United States has con-ducted “freedom of navigation patrols” through the South China Sea, stoking tension with China which says it will protect its sovereignty.

Australia is a staunch US ally.

Its navy ships Anzac, Toowoomba and Success are on a three-month deployment in Southeast Asia, which will involve exercises with a number of countries in the region, the Australian Defence Department said in a statement on April 17.

The Toowoomba sailed to Vietnam from Malaysia, while the other two Australian war-ships went through the South China Sea from Subic Bay in the Philippines.

Pakistani traders from the North Waziristan tribal district shout slogans during a protest in Islamabad yesterday. They were protesting following military operations in 2014 against the Taliban, that they say damaged local business.

Traders protest against crackdown on Taliban

PML-N not to propose names for caretaker prime ministerINTERNEWS

ISLAMABAD: The Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) has decided not to propose names for the caretaker prime minister and has practically surrendered options to the opposition Pakistan People’s Party (PPP), thus paving the way for a consensus caretaker prime minister in June.

“Nawaz Sharif conveyed this to Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi who informed

the Leader of the Opposition in the National Assembly Syed Khursheed Shah during his April 11 meeting held in Islamabad,” a key leader of PML-N informed yesterday.

Earlier, there was a strong possibility that both the PML-N and the PPP would not agree to any consensus candidate, in case both give panels of their choice. The incumbent PML-N gov-ernment is all set to end its five-year tenure by the end of next month.

Nawaz Sharif, according to sources, wants that instead of “anyone else,” the slot of the caretaker prime minister should be filled in by the rec-ommendation of the political parties.

Sources claim that Nawaz Sharif knew that the opposition PPP would not accept the nom-inees of his party and the issue would ultimately be decided by the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP),which he does not want.

UN honours 7 Pakistani peacekeepersINTERNEWS

KARACHI: Seven Pakistani peacekeepers who laid down their lives for global peace and security were honoured with a medal at the annual memorial ceremony held at United Nations headquarters in New York. UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres attended the programme as chief guest and paid homage to the peacekeepers who lost their lives in the line of duty.

Pakistan has been one of the largest troop contributing countries for UN peace-keeping missions across the globe. So far, 156 Pakistani blue helmets have embraced martyrdom while serving under the UN umbrella.

The seven Pakistani peacekeepers honoured yes-terday were Naik Qaiser Abbas (UN Multidimensional Integrated Stabilisation Mission in the Central African Republic), Sepoy Yasir Abbas (African Union/UN Hybrid operation in Darfur), Sepoy Muhammad Ishtiaq Abbasi (UN Organisation Stabili-sation Mission in the Demo-cratic Republic of the Congo), Havildar Zishan Ahmed (MONUSCO Congo), Sepoy Hazrat Bilal (MINUSCA Central African Republic), Naik Abdul Ghafoor (MINUSCA Central African Republic) and Naik Attaur Rehman (MONUSCO Congo).

Dynastic politics forced on PPP, says Bilawal BhuttoINTERNEWS

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) Chairman Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari has said that the PPP did not choose to be dynastic rather it was brought upon the party.

“My grandfather was killed (hanged by the court), which forced my mother to enter pol-itics, and she was assassinated, which forced me in,” said the young leader in an interview with the BBC’s Hardtalk.

“I will not go into the merits or the demerits of dynastic politics,”

said Bhutto-Zardari when asked if the PPP was a party only of the Bhutto family. He said while it was true that dynastic politics had no place in modern democracies, it was a reality in Pakistan.

He said the party that he co-heads with his father Asif Ali Zardari was representative of a democratic, socially just and modern Pakistan.

When asked about who really runs the party — his father or Bilawal himself — he said the party made all decisions with consensus and no one person was in charge.

To a question whether the

PPP had forgotten its ideology, and what it stood for, he said the PPP had always been committed to democracy and that it main-tained its roots. He said the party would look to his grandfather’s slogan of roti, kapra, and makaan to campaign for the elections.

He claimed that the PPP’s opposition to the Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) was the reason why the party did not do well in the 2013 elections.

He pointed out that the TTP had specifically called out the PPP as its enemy, while openly supporting the Pakistan Muslim

League-Nawaz (PML-N), the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) and the Jamaat-i-Islami (JI).

He said the Taliban supported these three parties, calling them “allies” and gave them a “free hand” in the run-up to the polls.

“My candidates were kid-napped; the prime minister’s son was kidnapped and the former governor’s son was also kidnapped.”

He said it was not only the TTP that was out against his party, but also anti-democratic elements within the country: “We were not allowed to

campaign, the political chief justice of the time — who has now gone on to form his own party — stopped my father from campaigning.”

About the obstacles the PPP faced, Bhutto-Zardari pointed out that no political actor any-where in the world could have overcome the problems.

Asked what the PPP thought of allegations of corruption and Asif Zardari’s image tarnished by corruption cases, the chairman answered that his father had spent over 11 years in prison “without a conviction”.

Farmers planting peanuts in a field in Liaocheng in China’s eastern Shandong province.

High-tech peanut farming

5 die in eastern Afghan roadside bomb explosionAP

KABUL: An Afghan official said a roadside bomb has killed five people in eastern Nangarhar province.

Attaul lah Khogyani , spokesman for the provincial

governor, said the explosion struck a vehicle in the Aska Mina district yesterday, killing the five and also wounding 14 civilians.

He said women and children were among the victims.

No one immediately took

responsibility for the bombing but Khogyani blamed the Taliban, saying they regularly plant roadside bombs targeting Afghan officials and security forces.

Afghanistan has the highest number of mine victims in the

world, which along with other roadside bombs kill or wound scores of civilians.

Earlier this month, the U N mission in Afghanistan said the country’s civilian death toll in the first three months of this year was a staggering 763 people.

Heavyweights in run for PTI ticket from IslamabadINTERNEWS

ISLAMABAD: As many as 13 PTI heavyweights have so far applied for party tickets to contest the next general elec-tions on three national assembly seats of the federal capital.

Senior PTI leaders including Asad Umar, Saifullah Khan Niazi, Amir Kiyani and Dr Babar Awan are also among the hopefuls.

Sources in the PTI said in addition to the 13 individuals, another four applications for tickets are currently under process.

The deadline for submitting the application is May 4 so there is a possibility that the number of ticket aspirants from the federal capital may increase.

Following delimitation of constituencies in the country, the number of National Assembly seats in the Islamabad Capital Territory have been increased from two to three - NA-52, NA-53 and NA-54.

NA-52 ICT-I will be con-sisting of rural areas including

Ali Pur, Jandala, Muhrian, Pind Begwal, Kuri, Tummair, Tarlai Kalan, Tarlai Khurd and Farash.

Four ticket aspirants have so far applied from this constit-uency — including Ilyas Meharban, Raja Khurrum Nawaz, Abida Raja and Pir Hasnain.

NA-53 ICT-II will be con-sisting of areas including Mohra Nur, Phulgaran, Suhan Dehati, Chattar, Mouza Shahzad Town and Lakhwal and five PTI leaders are in a run for party ticket from this constituency - including Amir Kiyani, Dr Babar Awan, Ali Nawaz Awan, Ali Bokhari, and Ilyas Meharban.

Similarly, for NA-54 ICT-III consisting of urban areas, some four ticket aspirants are in contest - including Asad Umar, Saifullah Khan Niazi, Amir Mughal and Semi Ezdi.

A senior PTI leader said out of three constituencies of the federal capital, so far the party ticket from NA-54 is confirmed that will be given to Asad Umar.

The decision on the rest of the two constituencies would be made later.

“As they have done for many decades, Australian vessels and aircraft will continue to exercise rights under international law to freedom of navigation and overflight, including in the South China Sea,” the Australian Defence Department said.

07SATURDAY 21 APRIL 2018 ASIA

Ahead of Malaysian polls, bots flood Twitter with pro-govt messagesREUTERS

KUALA LUMPUR: Just weeks before Malaysia goes to the polls, automated accounts known as bots are flooding Twitter with tens of thousands of pro-government and anti-opposition messages, according to a review of the tweets by Reuters and a US digital media research institute.

Asked about the matter, San Francisco-based Twitter Inc said it was focused on identifying and suspending accounts that violate its spam policies.

“We continue to fight hard to tackle any malicious auto-mation on our platform as well as spam accounts,” it said, without giving specific details.

A source close to the matter said the company had suspended 500 accounts involved in the messages on the Malaysian election since they involved spam or malicious automation.

Twitter bots, accounts which can post, like or resend tweets automatically, are not illegal in

Malaysia and seem to be having minimal impact on its election campaign. But they have come under global scrutiny amid probes into Russian meddling in the 2016 U.S. elections using social media platforms.

Ahmad Maslan, the infor-mation technology bureau chairman of Prime Minister Najib Razak’s United Malays National Organisation (UMNO), said he did not know who was behind the bot activity and that it was not his team. The government’s communications and multimedia minister Salleh Said Keruak did not respond to calls or text mes-sages seeking comment.

A researcher at the Digital Forensic Research (DFR) Lab of the Washington-based Atlantic Council think tank said over 17,000 bots tweeted content related to the Malaysian election over the last week.

Nine of the top 10 most active bot accounts containing anti-opposition hashtags and pro-government messages had

Russian-sounding names and used the Cyrillic script, said Donara Barojan, a research asso-ciate at DFR.

“The prevalence of bots with Cyrillic screen names does not suggest that Russian social media users are meddling in the Malaysian elections, but does indicate that whoever is behind the campaign purchased some bots created by Russian-speaking bot herders,” she said.

Malaysia will hold a general election on May 9 with Najib’s Barisan Nasional (BN) coalition, which is dominated by UMNO, locked in a tough battle with former premier Mahathir Mohamad and his opposition alliance.

The tweets included visuals illustrating Malaysian gov-ernment policies and ques-tioning the opposition’s promises. Some tweets had photos of BN supporters carrying party flags and “I love PM” signs.

The tweets also include hashtags: either BN’s campaign

slogans or anti-opposition phrases or both. The hashtags that express disapproval of the opposition coalition Pakatan Harapan (PH) include ‘#Say-NoToPH’ and ‘#KalahkanPa-katan’, which means “Defeat Pakatan” in Malay.

Two of the anti-opposition hashtags - ‘#SayNoToPH’ and ‘#KalahkanPakatan’ - were used around 44,100 times by 17,600 users during April 12-20 and 98 percent of the users appear to be bots, according to Barojan.

Many of the graphics attached to the tweets credited UMNO’s information technology department and some provided details of social media pages of BN-linked accounts. There was no evidence that these accounts are behind the automated tweets. Syed Saddiq Syed Abdul Rahman, a youth leader in the opposition alliance, accused the BN coalition of being behind the bot campaign but added that the impact from the bot activity was “miniscule.” He did not

elaborate. Twitter is not as popular in Malaysia as Facebook, although a lot of political dis-course appears on the platform.

Automated tweets of this scale are meant to generate traffic around the content they post, and get ‘human’ users to participate, but that has not hap-pened yet in Malaysia, according to DFR Lab.

Twitter and Facebook are under scrutiny in the United States where lawmakers suspect their platforms were used as part of an alleged Russian effort to sway the 2016 U.S. presidential election in favour of Donald Trump. The Kremlin has denied the accusations.

The Times reported last year that Russian Twitter accounts posted almost 45,000 messages about Brexit in the 48 hours around the 2016 referendum in Britain, and that many of the messages appear to have come from bots or cyborg accounts. Russia has denied meddling in Brexit.

Manila decries European Parliament’s interferenceREUTERS

MANILA: The Philippines has denounced what it called inter-ference in its internal affairs by the European Parliament, which urged the Southeast Asian country to end “extrajudicial killings” and halt plans to bring back the death penalty.

Philippine police have killed about 4,100 people since Pres-ident Rodrigo Duterte took power in late June 2016 in what the authorities say were shootouts during anti-narcotics operations. Activists say many of the killings were executions, which police deny.

At least other 2,300 drug-related deaths have also occurred, at the hands of what police say are unknown assassins.

The European lawmakers, in a resolution on Thursday, condemned Philippine author-ities for “trying to justify these murders with falsified evi-dence”, which Manila said was meddling and based on wrong information.

“The European Parliament has crossed a red line when it called for unwarranted actions against the Philippines,” Foreign Secretary Alan Peter Cayetano said in a statement late on Thursday.

In the latest violence in the campaign against drugs, police announced the killing of 13 people and arrest of 46 in 49 anti-drug operations in Bulacan province, north of the capital

Manila, in a span of 12 hours on Friday.

The European Parliament and its members have criticised the Philippines’ brutal anti-nar-cotics crackdown several times, infuriating Duterte, who has directed his frustration at the European Union, rather than its legislative branch.

The EU is an important source of development aid, commerce and investment for the Philippines.

European lawmakers also called on Manila to remove what they called human rights defenders from its list of people it considers “terrorists”, including Victoria Tauli-Corpuz, the U.N. special rapporteur on the rights of indigenous peoples.

They also condemned “the intimidation and the abuse” of rights activists and journalists, and said Duterte’s push to reintroduce the death penalty was against the country’s inter-

national obligations. Cayetano said the European

Parliament’s resolution was based on “biased, incomplete and even wrong information and does not reflect the true sit-uation on the ground”.

“In case the members of the European Parliament are not aware of it, may we remind them that their recommended actions already constitute inter-ference in the affairs of a sov-ereign state,” he said.

New York-based Human Rights Watch applauded the European Parliament for adopting the resolution and for its support for international efforts to investigate the Phil-ippine crackdown.

“It is a timely and forceful message from the EU parlia-mentarians putting President Duterte and his backers on notice - that continued grave abuses will come at a price,” a researcher for the rights group, Carlos Conde, said in a statement.

Presidential spokesman Harry Roque said the European Parliament was criticising what the EU supported financially.

“I find it inconsistent that the European Parliament will condemn the war against drugs, which is now also being financed partly by the European Union,” Roque said in a media briefing.

He was referring to ¤3.8m ($4.7m) in EU aid announced in March for government drug rehabilitation projects.

Hundreds search through rubble in devastated Philippine cityREUTERS

MARAWI CITY: Surrounded by the ruins of homes they fled nearly a year ago, many resi-dents of war-torn Marawi City in the Philippines were in tears when they briefly returned this week and sifted through rubble to salvage any possessions they could find.

The Muslim-majority city of 200,000 was over-run by militants loyal to Islamic State (IS) last May, who fought the military for five months before they were ousted. After almost daily aerial bombard-ments and artillery fire, large parts of the picturesque, lakeside city have been devastated.

Hundreds of residents who had fled to refugee camps or to relatives’ homes in nearby towns were briefly allowed back by authorities to the ruins of the central business district on Thursday. Calim Ali, 50, stepped out of her vehicle to find a ruined, empty plot where her home had stood in the bustling heart of the city. The only pos-session she could recover was a charred weighing scale that she said her family used in their fruit and rice business.

“I brought empty sacks. I thought we would still find something, like pots, and our money box,” Ali said, while her husband searched through the

thick vegetation growing in the rubble. Ali’s family is among about 27,000 others that lived in the main battle area, straddling over 24 barangays, or municipal dis-tricts. The area has remained off limits until this month, when the military said it had cleared it of hazards like booby traps and unexploded ordnance.

No civilian was permitted to stay in the area after 3pm on Thursday, and the rule will remain in place on other days when visits are permitted, officials said. There are 20 other barangays in the city which were not affected, and 50 others which were spared heavy shelling. Families have moved back to these areas.

Indonesian fishermen rescue Rohingya in sea off AcehAP

BIREUEN, INDONESIA: Indo-nesian fishermen rescued 76 Rohingya Muslims stranded off the coast of Aceh yesterday, authorities said, in the latest attempt by members of the persecuted ethnic group to flee Myanmar by sea.

The police chief of Bireuen regency in Aceh on the island of Sumatra, Riza Yulianto, said the group of eight children, 25 women and 43 men was brought ashore in their wooden boat Friday afternoon. It was unclear how long they had been at sea.

Aceh’s Disaster Mitigation Agency said the Rohingya told local authorities that they wanted to reach Australia.

The agency said it

was coordinating with the local government to provide temporary shelter. It said seven people were given medical treatment. Officials were interviewing the refugees, and villagers had donated clothes and food, said Hidayatullah from the local civic group Rapid Response Action.

Hidayatullah, who uses one name, said fisherman went to the aid of the Rohingya after seeing the boat at about 2 p.m. Its sail wasn’t working, he said.

Myanmar’s persecution of its Rohingya Muslim minority has sparked an exodus of hundreds of thousands of people over land into neighboring Bangladesh since August. Some have also tried to flee by boat.

An Indonesian fishing boat rescued a group of five Rohingya

Muslims found in weak condition off westernmost Aceh province on April 6 after a 20-day voyage in which five other people died.

Just days before, Malaysian

authorities intercepted a vessel car-rying 56 people believed to be Rohingya refugees and brought the vessel and its passengers to shore. About 700,000 Rohingya have

fled Myanmar’s western Rakhine state to neighboring Bangladesh in the past seven months to escape a brutal counterinsurgency cam-paign by Myanmar’s army.

North and South Korea install hotlineREUTERS

SEOUL: Diplomatic foes North and South Korea installed a direct phone line between their leaders yesterday as they prepare for the first summit since 2007 - and the connection was great, the South’s presidential office said.

South Korea’s presi-dential Blue House and North Korea’s State Affairs Com-mission tested the hot line for four minutes before South Korea’s Moon Jae-in and North Korea’s Kim Jong Un talk ahead of next week’s summit, the office said.

“The call quality was very good and we felt like we got a call from our next-door neighbour,” South Korea’s director for the Government Situation Room, Youn Kun-young, told reporters. Moon will now be able to pick up his office phone to talk to Kim, instead of communicating through a hot line at the Joint Security Area in the border village of Panmunjom.

Residents return to their homes for the first time since the battle between government troops and Islamic State militants began in May last year, in the city of Marawi, southern Philippines, yesterday.

A group of Rohingya refugees makes their way to a temporary shelter after landing in Aceh province on Sumatra island, yesterday.

The European lawmakers, in a resolution on Thursday, condemned Philippine authorities for “trying to justify these murders with falsified evidence”, which Manila said was meddling and based on wrong information.

Chinese ship doing research near disputed islets: Japan

TOKYO: Japan said yesterday that a Chinese vessel was carrying out a suspected maritime research in Tokyo’s exclusive economic zone near the disputed islands in the East China Sea.

A Japanese patrol boat confirmed that the Chinese research ship was sailing by extending a wire into the sea some 150km northeast of one of the Senkaku islands, a coastguard spokesman said.

“We told them to stop the research activities but they have not reacted to our instruction,” the spokesman said, adding that the Japanese patrol boat continued moni-toring the Chinese vessel.

Global Dryland Alliance (GDA), an initiative put forward by the Emir H H Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, is a bold step to guarantee food security for a population of three billion in more than 50 countries.

The action was illegal only if by legality we mean approval by the UN Security Council. But the Security Council is not a neutral adjudicating authority like a court. Its decisions are constrained by the interests of its permanent members.

THE WASHINGTON POST

08 SATURDAY 21 APRIL 2018VIEWS

CHAIRMANSHEIKH THANI BIN ABDULLAH AL THANI

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

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

ESTABLISHED IN 1996

EDITORIAL

Qatar’s global initiative

The State of Qatar is always in the forefront to alle-viate the sufferings of the people who are sub-jected to the consequences of food insecurity and

negative environmental and economic impacts asso-ciated with climate change. Thus the idea of the foun-dation of Global Dryland Alliance (GDA), an initiative put forward by the Emir H H Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani during a speech at the 68th UN General Assembly in 2013, is considered as a bold step in this regard that would help global efforts to guarantee food security for a population of three billion in more than 50 countries.

The foundation treaty of GDA was proposed to the countries that supported the initiative during a minis-terial conference in the Moroccan city of Marrakesh in 2015, followed by the Global Dryland Alliance (GDA) Founding Conference in Doha last October under the auspices of the Emir, in which delegates from 25 coun-tries and international organizations from the Middle East, Africa, Central and East Asia, and South America attended. The Doha meet has witnessed the signing of

the foundation treaty of the new organisation.

On Thursday, the Minister of State for Foreign Affairs H E Sultan bin Saad Al Muraikhi signed an agreement with GDA Executive Director Ambassador Bader Al Dafa, making Doha the 11-member alliance’s new head-quarters. Qatar, as the founder of the GDA, has already announced that it will bankroll the opera-tional budget of the Alliance for two years.

Drylands have become a major issue given their space in the globe. Under the United Nations classification, drylands exist in 51 countries which are home to almost 3 billion people. During the 2010 Millennium Development Goals Review Summit, the UN General Assembly

had expressed its concern about lack of progress in regards to eradication of poverty and hunger in dryland countries where half of the world’s hungry and poor live.

Thus the initiative is of great importance as the world population grows exponentially, with it expected to reach nine billion by 2050 and as the global temperatures con-tinue to rise and the ongoing threat of climate change making it more difficult to meet the required food needs. The global food production must increase by 70 percent in 2050 with dryland nations being vulnerable to food crises and harsh cycles of drought, desertification, poverty and hunger.

The GDA aims to become an international organi-sation to combat food insecurity and to develop solu-tions for shared food security problems and exchange expertise in times of crises. It also will work with local, regional, and international partners to identify, dissem-inate, and implement solutions for agricultural, water, and energy challenges of dryland countries.

GDA aims to provide support to researches and new innovations of member states and to implement the results. The alliance also aims to provide the best prac-tices that can be shared with dryland countries around the world. Some land will be allocated to set up storage for cattle, a farm and laboratory to conduct research on desert and dryland.

Syria in 2018 is not Iraq in 2003

Last Saturday, when the United States, the UK and France launched strikes on three chemical facilities in Syria, the

move was met with disapproval in some quarters. The pre-announced spectacle blew up three buildings and took no lives, but some pronounced it a “dangerous escalation”. Some spoke of its “illegality”. All complained about its disregard for the OPCW investigation.

The action, which lasted less than an hour, was an escalation only if eve-rything that preceded it was normal. By this reckoning, Syria has now returned to its status quo of genocide by the Assad regime.

The action was illegal only if by legality we mean approval by the UN Security Council. But the Security Council is not a neutral adjudicating authority like a court. Its decisions are constrained by the interests of its per-manent members. To say an action is “legal”, in this case, would be to say: “Vladimir Putin approved”.

What then of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) investigation?

This depends on what answer is being sought. Because the OPCW’s remit does not include apportioning blame. Untrammelled access for the OPCW would have merely proved what was already known: that a chemical attack took place. It would not have resolved the manufactured controversy over who was responsible (manufactured, because there is only one party in Syria with the means, intention and history of deploying chemical weapons by air).

But had the OPCW confirmed Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad’s responsi-bility, what conse-quences should have followed?

Last year, after the Khan Sheikhoun chemical attack, the UN did respond to the calls for an investi-gation by cre-ating the UN-OPCW Joint Investi-gation Mech-anism (JIM)

with the authority to identify perpe-trators. But once the JIM concluded that al-Assad was responsible for the attack, Russia revoked its authority. And the fact that the UN confirmed the regime’s responsibility for the attack didn’t provoke any calls for accounta-bility from the crowd currently insisting on the sanctity of the legal process.

All calls for “more investigation” sputter into platitudes about a “nego-tiated settlement” or “UN authorised action” (which, is another way of saying “never”, since Putin is unlikely to grant western powers the authority to act against his interests).

Fetishising a dubious legal process thus becomes a temporising measure that grants the perpetrators of mass crime impunity against the palpable illegality of using chemical weapons. That the case is not made in good faith is obvious from the analogy that often accompanies it.

Should we be trusting the same governments and agencies that lied to us about Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction (WMDs)?

Considering the ubiquity of the Iraq analogy, it would seem that the old cliche that generals are always fighting the last war also applies to their critics. Syria is Iraq only if facile juxtapositions replace substantive comparisons. Beyond the fact that both countries have been led by Baa-thist regimes that brought immense misery upon their people, there is no concrete detail in which Syria and Iraq are similar.

In 2003, Iraq was invaded even though there was no imminent humanitarian catastrophe demanding action; in Syria, the regime has been on a rampage since 2011, yet only on two occasions has it been subjected to limited and rather ineffective military strikes on “humanitarian grounds”.

Where in Iraq, the US and Britain had used false pretexts for action, in Syria real and frequent violations have only twice shaken the west out of inaction. Where in Iraq, the alleged possession of WMDs was deemed suf-ficient grounds for an invasion, their confirmed use in Syria has only belatedly occasioned a response, largely symbolic, lacking shock or

awe. The analogy also seems ignorant of the knowns and unknowns in the case against Iraq. In 2003, despite intense US pressure, international bodies like the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the United Nations Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission (UNMOVIC) and OPCW declined to endorse the administration’s case against Iraq. In Syria, the regime hasn’t denied its pos-session of chemical weapons and the UN has confirmed their use on at least 34 occasions.

But what of the claim that a “deep state” is trying to mislead us into war, as it did in Iraq?

In 2002, the CIA resisted adminis-tration pressure to provide a defensible rationale for invading Iraq. Then Vice President Dick Cheney had to per-sonally visit the CIA’s headquarters in Langley several times to pressure ana-lysts to produce an assessment favourable to the administration’s case. But, in spite of the bullying, the “deep state” (including the CIA, Defense Intel-ligence Agency, the Department of Energy and the State Department) delivered their combined judgment in a caveat-laden National Intelligence Estimate that would only confirm that if left unchecked, Iraq may develop nuclear weapons in a decade.

The Bush administration recog-nised the inadequacy of the assessment and, in the end, had to rely on two ad hoc operations based in the Pentagon to produce its own politicised intelli-gence, outside the recalcitrant channels of the “deep state”. French, German and British intelligence also failed to oblige Bush.

In Syria, by contrast, US, British, and French intelligence agencies have been unanimous in delivering con-fident judgments on the regime’s responsibility for the chemical attack. These judgments have been corrobo-rated by Open Source Intelligence (OSINT), journalistic investigations, witness testimonies, human rights organisations, and, of course, the UN Commission of Inquiry on Syria (which confirmed at least 34 instances of the regime’s use of chemical weapons even before Douma).

The case for Iraq never came close to achieving this kind of consensus.

MUHAMMAD IDREES AHMAD AL JAZEERA

QUOTE OF THE DAY

The right solution is not to engage

in any kind of war against China, the right solution is to

engage China.

Bruno Le Maire French Finance Minister

Trump’s policies stress-test the world economy

Taking stock of the global economy as finance ministers and central-bank governors gathered in Washington for its

spring meetings, the International Monetary Fund found reason for concern. “[R]isks beyond the next several quarters clearly lean to the downside,” it reports.

Well, that’s hardly unusual -- the IMF exists to be concerned. Rarely, though, has it had better grounds.

To be sure, much of the world economy has done pretty well lately, with the US leading the way. The IMF’s World Economic Outlook projects global growth of roughly 4 percent this year and next, and US growth of 2.9 percent and 2.7 percent — better than previously forecast. This good news is misleading, though, because it disguises mounting risks to growth and stability. And dangers freshly made in America are high on the list.

The world economy is coming to the end of a catch-up phase. After a prolonged recovery from the crisis of 2008, the current uptick in growth brings many economies closer to full

capacity — when growth must decline to a slower and more sustainable long-term pace. With this point fast approaching, monetary policy remains very loose in the US, Europe and else-where. That’s the first big risk: Shifting back to interest rates consistent with full employment will put stress on economies grown accustomed to cheap money.

The US has compounded this macr-oeconomic problem by delivering fiscal stimulus the country didn’t need. Pres-ident Donald Trump joined with Republicans in Congress to enact a tax-reform law and a budget that, taken together, will worsen an already bad fiscal position. Ten years after the crash, US government debt still stands at almost 110 percent of gross domestic product. Far from expecting this ratio to decline over the coming years, the IMF projects it to rise further -- to 117 percent by 2023. By then it would be about the same as Italy’s debt ratio and almost three times Germany’s.

Such heavy fiscal pressure helps growth in the short term but greatly complicates the Federal Reserve’s job, adding to the risk that interest rates will rise faster than expected. The

hazards arising from the effort to nor-malize monetary policy would be bad enough by themselves. This fiscal piling on makes matters so much worse. On top of all this — and, incredibly, as another deliberate act of policy — the US government has brought tensions over trade to their worst level in decades.

President Donald Trump has blithely abandoned America’s long-standing commitment to open markets and liberal trade, saying he expects to win a trade war easily. He’s announced new tariffs, aimed especially at China, and says these will be implemented unless last-minute concessions are made. At the moment, financial markets appear to think he’s bluffing (as indeed he may be) or that US trade partners will fold under pressure (also possible). For whatever reason, investors aren’t yet taking Trump’s trade threats all that seriously.

Again, draw little comfort from this. Sentiment can shift in an instant. If Trump really does start a trade war, at a time when US financial conditions and macroeconomic policy pose risks of their own, watch out. The road back to economic sanity could be bumpy.

Internet penetration is now so extensive — even in the poorest areas — that fake stories dressed up as fact can go viral on social media overnight and reach massive audiences with often dire consequences.

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Asian push to crack down on ‘fake news’ sparks alarm

ELI LAKE BLOOMBERG

SAM REEVES AFP

Trump is not Nixon and North Korea is not China

If you Google “Trump,” “Nixon” and “China,” you will find billions of pixels devoted to comparing the 37th president’s break-

through with Beijing to the potential summit between Donald Trump and Kim Jong Un.

The parallel is understandable. It took a committed anti-communist to open relations with Communist China. Perhaps it will take a president who threatened “fire and fury” to open ties to the leader he called “little rocket man.” In 1972 when Mao Zedong hosted President Richard Nixon in Beijing, Communist China suffered severe international isolation in much the way North Korea does today. Like Mao, Kim espouses a harsh collec-tivism that imposes misery, famine and death on his people.

All of that said, Trump’s will-ingness to meet with North Korea’s dictator is not really comparable to the opening of relations between the US and China. The latter was far more important strategically and economi-cally for both countries. What’s more, the geopolitical conditions that drove China to go to Nixon were entirely dif-ferent from those today for the grandson of the “Great Leader” in Pyongyang.

Let’s start with China. By 1972, Mao’s China had a rocky relationship with the Soviet Union. Three years earlier, the two powers almost went to war over a dispute about the Zhenbao

Island and the Ussuri River on their borders. Former US State Department analyst Helmut Sonnenfeldt told the Association for Diplomatic Studies & Training in a 2000 interview that he believed a US-China thaw “could be of some help in getting the Soviets to play ball on some issues that we were inter-ested in.”

That feeling was mutual. Mao’s China also believed that cooperating with the US in limited areas would be a useful balance for its relationship with the Soviets. As Sonnenfeldt explained, eventually the US was able to get sophisticated technical equipment into China to monitor Soviet compliance with a nuclear test ban treaty.

Kim is facing a very different set of problems today. To start, he presides over a weak country that relies almost exclusively on China for the power and trade that allows his regime to survive. China’s relationship with the Soviet Union during the Nixon years was one of two rival great powers, not a client-state relationship that North Korea has with China. Where Mao was motivated by an opportunity to cooperate against a common adversary by turning a foe to a friend, no such opportunity exists for Kim.

It’s hard to distill Kim’s motiva-tions for these gestures toward US talks, because North Korea is after all the Hermit Kingdom -- with no free media and an opaque regime. But there are two leading theories. The first is that Kim is motivated by fear, the second that he is motivated by confidence.

Michael Auslin, a scholar on con-temporary Asia at the Hoover Insti-tution, puts it like this: “One theory is that Kim is rattled and scared by the unknown quantity of Trump, and he doesn’t know how far will he go.” This view is bolstered after the implemen-tation of the US-led “maximum pressure” campaign that has targeted North Korea’s hard currency reserves.

The breaking point has not yet come, but perhaps Kim can see it coming in the near future. In this sense, Auslin says, Kim is pursuing a summit with Trump to take the pressure off.

Auslin says the second big theory of Kim’s motivation is all about the nuclear weapons Trump is trying to get Kim to relinquish. “Now that Kim has shown he has a ballistic missile and a nuclear capability, he feels he can negotiate from a position of strength,” Auslin told me. This is dif-ferent from other moments in US-North Korean nuclear diplomacy, Auslin said. In the 1990s, the regime’s nuclear program was still theoretical; it had not yet tested a nuclear device. In the 2000s, the regime had tested a device but didn’t have reliable inter-continental ballistic missiles to reach the US Today, the Kim regime has both of those things and only needs to finish work on miniaturizing a warhead to fit on those missiles.

Auslin said it’s possible that Kim believes he can turn a summit that is ostensibly meant to negotiate the terms of his disarmament into a pledge from the US to recognize North Korea as a nuclear-weapons-capable state.

As Trump once said, Kim will keep us in suspense. In the meantime it’s important to understand what the potential summit is and is not. It may present a chance to remove the threat of nuclear missiles aimed at American cities. That’s always a worthy goal.

But there is no chance this sum-mitry will unshackle a great power the way Nixon’s fateful trip to China did in 1972. China remains authori-tarian and a danger to its neighbors. But the opening and normalization that began nearly 50 years ago has modernized its economy and lifted hundreds of millions of people out of subsistence poverty. Today China, whether we like it or not, plays an important role in world affairs.

IInflammatory stories masquer-ading as real news pose a particu-larly toxic threat in Asian coun-tries with long-standing religious

and ethnic divides, but promises by some regional leaders to tackle the problem carry equal menace.

Borrowing from US President Donald Trump’s political playbook, government heads with an authori-tarian streak are using the mantra of “fake news” to shield themselves from negative media coverage, and push legislation that critics say is aimed more at stifling dissent than punishing fabrication.

The problem they profess to be addressing is a genuine one.

Internet penetration is now so extensive — even in the poorest areas — that fake stories dressed up as fact can go viral on social media overnight and reach massive audiences with often dire consequences.

In India last year, seven people were killed by a mob after a false story spread on WhatsApp that they were child-traffickers, while in Myanmar, doctored photos and bogus reports shared on Facebook have fuelled the

persecution of Rohingya Muslims.A number of Asian leaders have

tapped into the resulting public concern and launched campaigns that claim to target malign rumour-mongers but, experts say, actually serve to turn the screws on critical media and political opponents.

“This vague notion of ‘fake news’, which has been used and abused by US President Donald Trump, is a boon for governments who want to muzzle overcurious independent voices,” Daniel Bastard, head of the Asia-Pacific desk at Reporters Without Borders (RSF), said.

Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte — who once memorably warned media that “just because you’re a journalist, you’re not exempted from assassination” -- has regularly accused news outlets critical of his deadly war on drugs of peddling fake news.

He has openly attacked a top newspaper and broadcaster, while the biggest target of the media clampdown has been news website Rappler.

Philippine authorities have can-celled its corporate licence over claims

the outlet violated foreign ownership laws and filed a criminal complaint over an alleged failure to pay taxes on bonds it issued.

- Pushing legislation - In Cam-bodia, authoritarian Prime Minister Hun Sen has openly praised Trump’s “Fake News Awards” -- handed out in January by the president to his usual targets, including CNN and The New York Times — and lobbed the “fake news” charge at his own media critics.

It has helped provide ammunition for his government’s sweeping assault on independent media in recent months, with the widely-respected Cambodia Daily newspaper shuttered after being hit with a huge tax bill and dozens of independent radio stations closed.

Some countries are seeking to leg-islate against fake news, sparking con-cerns that the laws will be used to stifle dissent.

Malaysia enacted a law this month that punishes publishers of false reports with up to six years in jail, which observers say is a clear bid to stifle criticism of scandal-hit Prime Minister Najib Razak before elections next month.

Singapore has been holding parlia-mentary hearings to consider measures, including laws, against what the government terms “deliberate online falsehoods” while the Philip-pines is considering legislation that could see publishers of fake news pun-ished with up to 20 years in jail.

Clarissa David, a media expert at University of the Philippines, warned that any such law in the Philippines may become “a tool for censorship” that could be used to “silence legit-imate news organisations from cov-ering stories that are unfavourable to groups in power”.

Michael Vatikiotis, a Southeast Asia expert, said that legislating against fake news “puts journalists in deeper peril”.

“Unlike normal justifications for curbing media freedom, fake news is a broad, catch-all definition that is wholly subjective,” Vatikiotis, an author and former journalist, said.

Still, fake news is undoubtedly a real threat and has sparked particular alarm in Europe where governments are worried that Russia may try to meddle in elections, following allega-tions that Moscow sought to tilt the 2016 US poll in Trump’s favour.

Germany has passed a law threat-ening social networks with fines if they

In 1972 when Mao Zedong hosted President Richard Nixon in Beijing, Communist China suffered severe international isolation in much the way North Korea does today. Like Mao, Kim espouses a harsh collectivism that imposes misery, famine and death on his people.

do not remove bogus reports and hate speech while Brussels is working on a Europe-wide plan to tackle fake news online.

But media rights groups are against legislation, arguing instead for the press to follow a strict set of standards they set themselves, and for social media giants such as Facebook to come up with respon-sible policies to stem the flood of misleading information.

RSF’s Bastard warned that the idea of social media companies policing themselves could pose as many problems as governments passing laws, however.

“Will (Facebook CEO) Mark Zuckerberg decide what is ‘real’ or ‘fake’?” he said.

“Just as we have big reserva-tions when states want to control the ‘realness’ of news through leg-islation, we don’t want corpora-tions to decide it without any transparency.”

A commuter walking past a public service announcement that reads “sharing a lie makes you a liar” at a train station in downtown Kuala Lumpur.

10 SATURDAY 21 APRIL 2018EUROPE

Police raid French varsity amid protestAFP

PARIS: French riot police raided a university in Paris yesterday to evict students who occupied it over education reforms amid a months-long stand-off between trade unions and Pres-ident Emmanuel Macron.

Around a hundred officers took part in the dawn raid on the 22-storey tower block dom-inating the Tolbiac campus, one of several French faculties occupied in an echo of the momentous student-led protests of May 1968.

Railworkers, civil servants, retirement home workers, lawyers and students have all demonstrated in recent weeks over Macron’s shake-up of the

public service, but so far failed to knock him off course.

A day of nationwide protests on Thursday drew only around half as many people as a month ago, disappointing those who have been dreaming of a major showdown.

Students began occupying campuses in March over a new law that introduce an element of selection for access to uni-versity degree courses for the first time.

This week, the unrest spread to Paris’ prestigious Sciences Po university — Macron’s alma mater — which was taken over by protesters accusing Macron of running a “dictatorship”.

The Tolbiac campus, part of Paris 1 university, has been one

of the flashpoints in the movement.

Some of the students threw bottles and other objects at the police when they moved in yes-terday, a witness at the scene said. One person was arrested on charges of rebellion.

The entrance of the site which was guarded by police yesterday, was littered with tables, banners, bottles, rubbish bags and other objects.

The chancellor Georges Haddad accused the students of causing damage worth “several hundred thousands of euros” over the course of their sit-in.

“This is the nation’s money that is being wasted,” he said, expressing “relief” that the pro-testers had been dislodged.

French police block the entrance to the Tolbiac University, in Paris, yesterday.

Brexit: EU set to reject May’s Irish border planBLOOMBERG

LONDON: European Union offi-cials are set to reject a potential UK solution to the crucial issue of what happens to the Irish border after Brexit.

Failure to find a solution to avoid a border on the island of Ireland jeopardises the entire Brexit deal with less than a year before Britain leaves the bloc. Without it, the UK won’t get a transition period and will have to operate under World Trade Organization rules.

The UK has indicated during talks that the bloc’s “backstop” option that keeps Northern Ireland in a “common regulatory area” with the EU should apply

to the whole of the UK, according to three people familiar with the EU side of the negotiations. It would mean the whole UK stays in parts of the single market and customs union as a last resort.

That won’t work for the European Commission, which wants to offer that special status only to Northern Ireland. If Prime Minister Theresa May is to reverse her decision and keep the UK in a customs union, this can’t be done simply by applying the Northern Ireland model to the rest of the UK.

There are “difficulties and risk of failure” in the negotiations if no agreement is found on key topics such as the Irish border, Michel Barnier, the EU’s chief

negotiator, said yesterday. He warned of a “disorderly

exit” if a deal couldn’t be reached.The prime minister’s

spokesman, Max Blain, said yes-terday that the government is “confident” of solving the Northern Irish border issue “if everyone works together productively.”

Meanwhile, Chancellor of the Exchequer Philip Hammond said in Washington that staying in a customs union was not the best solution for the UK.

Finding a way to avoid customs checks on the border between Northern Ireland and Ireland after Brexit is proving the biggest obstacle for negotiators. Both sides agree that the

withdrawal treaty must include a “backstop” to keep the frontier invisible in case a better option doesn’t emerge.

But they can’t agree on what it should look like, and there is a creeping sense in the UK that May could be heading toward a capitulation on a key red line, which in turn would put her political survival at risk.

During this week’s talks, EU negotiators reiterated their rejection of the UK’s other pro-posals for customs and the Irish border, a partnership that would see the UK and the EU collect tariffs on each other’s behalves, and the use of technology to avoid customs checks, two of the people said.

If May backtracks on her promise to pull the UK out of the EU’s customs union, that would go a long way to solve the border issue and would also please busi-nesses that are keen on keeping trade easy.

The question then becomes how can she do so without trig-gering a revolt among Brexit hardliners in her Conservative Party.

With the main opposition party having thrown its weight behind staying in the customs union, the parliamentary maths is not in May’s favour, especially since she lost her majority and relies on a handful of votes from the Democratic Unionist Party in Northern Ireland.

Prince Charles named next Commonwealth headAP

LONDON: Heir to the British throne Prince Charles was approved yesterday as the next head of the Commonwealth of the UK and its former colonies, according to UK media reports.

Leaders from the 53-nation Commonwealth, holding a private meeting at Windsor Castle near London, agreed Charles should one day succeed his mother, Queen Elizabeth II, the BBC and other outlets said.

The Commonwealth was formed as Britain’s former col-onies gained their independence, and its first head was the queen’s father, King George VI.

Elizabeth has led the group since taking the throne in 1952. However, the position is not hereditary, and some people have suggested a non-royal leader would be more appro-priate in the 21st century.

The monarch — who turns 92 today — said on Thursday that she hoped her son and heir would one day “carry on the important work started by my father in 1949.”

The British government backed Charles to succeed his mother, and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said he agreed “very much” with the queen’s wishes.

T h e p o s i t i o n i s

largely symbolic, but the queen’s commitment has been a major force behind the survival of the Commonwealth. She has visited almost every member country, often multiple times, over her 66-year reign.

Charles is a longtime champion of environmental causes, a priority for the Com-monwealth. Its members include small island nations in the Car-ibbean and Pacific that are among the countries most vul-nerable to rising seas, fiercer storms and other effects of global climate change.

Protecting the world’s oceans is high on the agenda at the Com-monwealth meeting, alongside issues such as cybersecurity and trade.

Britain has tried to use the

biennial heads of government meeting to reinvigorate a dis-parate group that takes in 2.4 billion people on five continents but has struggled to carve out a firm place on the world stage.

The UK also wants to lay the groundwork for new trade deals with Commonwealth nations after Britain leaves the European Union next year.

But the summit has been overshadowed by uproar over the treatment by UK immigration authorities of some long-term British residents from the Caribbean.

May and other government ministers have apologised repeatedly after it emerged that

some people who settled in the UK in the decades after World War II had recently been refused medical care or threatened with deportation because they could not produce paperwork to show their right to reside in Britain.

The government said they accidentally fell afoul of new measures intended to clamp down on illegal immigration. But opposition politicians say the treatment of the “Windrush gen-eration” — named for the ship Empire Windrush, which brought the first big group of post-war Caribbean immigrants to Britain in 1948 — is cause for national shame.

The scandal deepened with

the revelation that officials several years ago destroyed thousands of landing cards of

postwar migrants, which could have helped people prove their status.

Queen Elizabeth and Prince Charles during the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting, in London, yesterday.

Leaders from the 53-nation Commonwealth, holding a private meeting at Windsor Castle near London, agreed Charles should one day succeed his mother, Queen Elizabeth II.

Britain’s Prime Minister Theresa May with leaders of the Commonwealth at St George’s Hall, in Windsor Castle.

54 people injured in Austria train collisionAFP

SALZBURG: Fifty-four people were treated for injuries after two train carriages collided at a station in the Austrian city of Salzburg yesterday, the state rail company OeBB said.

The accident happened when a carriage from a train arriving from Venice struck a carriage on the service from Swiss city, Zurich, to which it was meant to be coupled

before heading to Vienna.The “two carriages collided

for unknown reasons,” fire service official Reinhold Ortler said yesterday.

Around 240 people were on board the two trains, which contain both seated and sleeping compartments.

“Fifty four people were treated. Fortunately we’re only talking about light injuries,” OeBB spokesman Robert Mosser said.

Switzerland gets tough on cross-border crimeREUTERS

BERN: Switzerland’s top law enforcer took on 237 new criminal investigations last year, 25 percent more than in 2016, as one of the world’s most secretive financial centres steps up efforts to tackle inter-national crime.

Attorney General Michael Lauber, at a press conference yesterday, said his office was also working on 307 requests for mutual assistance from abroad, after getting nearly 200 new requests in 2017, many for help on complex, cross-border cases involving bribery, money laundering and potential extremism.

While he said his 234 staff

is “nearing its limits” with the present caseload, Lauber encouraged other countries to reach out to Switzerland for assistance as he seeks to undo Switzerland’s reputation as a place to hide illicit money in the country’s famed banks - and return it to its rightful owners.

Lauber’s 40-page report included details about high-profile cases lawyers were investigating, including more than 100 criminal cases relating to Brazilian oil company Petrobras. So far, that includes one criminal case against a bank in Switzerland.

“It’s possible there will be more,” Lauber said. “We’re doing this diligently, because

we know that the people involved as well as the Swiss financial institutions have good lawyers and we don’t want to be beaten on a technicality.”

Of $1.03bn frozen by author-ities in the Petrobras case, Swit-zerland has returned 200 million so far to Brazil, but Lauber said that amount will grow.

“You can be sure of one thing, we don’t want to keep the money, if it does not belong to the Swiss or the gov-ernment,” he said.

Ongoing investigations include the scandal-plagued world soccer body FIFA and its former Secretary General Jerome Valcke and German soccer star Franz Beckenbauer, Lauber said.

German migration official faces probe over bribe allegationAFP

BERLIN: An employee of the German migration agency is under investigation over suspicions that she may have granted asylum to 1,200 migrants in exchange for money or gifts in kind.

Investigators have opened a probe into “organised abuse of the asylum procedure” as well as for “corruption or bribery”, a spokeswoman for the Bremen prosecution service, Claudia Kueck, said. “To what extent was money or invitations involved is what the investi-gations are seeking to clarify.”

The suspected employee is the director of the migration agency’s regional office in Bremen, Kueck said.

Besides her, three lawyers, an interpreter and an interme-diary, are targeted in the probe. Investigators had raided eight sites including the lawyers’ practice in Bremen and Lower Saxony.

The asylum agency director is suspected of having collaborated with the three lawyers who sent her files of asylum seekers from across Germany.

Asylum allegedly agreed even though the applicants may not have always fulfilled criteria, said media reports.

11SATURDAY 21 APRIL 2018 EUROPE / AMERICAS

Hungarian Premier backs list of ‘Soros mercenaries’AFP

BUDAPEST: Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban (pictured) said yesterday he supported a magazine’s recent publication of a list of people it said were in the pay of liberal US billionaire George Soros.

Last week’s list in the pro-government weekly newspaper Figyelo contained the names of approximately 200 civil society workers, academics and journalists.

The magazine, owned by a close ally of Orban’s, said those named —called “The Specula-tor’s People” — were part of the 87-year-old Hungarian-born billionaire’s “network” in Hungary. In a radio interview yesterday, Orban, who has said the Hungarian authorities have information on around 2,000 “mercenaries” working for Soros, said the list was about “transparency”.

“I particularly encourage people in the press to help people know the facts by uncov-ering as many networks (...) as possible,” he said.

“If someone is not shy about accepting money from

foreigners he shouldn’t be ashamed to admit it either,” he said.

The list drew sharp criticism at home and abroad, including from the US embassy in Budapest and the UN’s Human Rights office, which accused Figyelo of “attacking the con-stantly shrinking space for civil society”.

The row comes two weeks after Orban was re-elected for a third consecutive term with a landslide two-thirds parlia-mentary majority that gives him legislative free rein for the next four years. The theme of thwarting Soros’s alleged efforts to encourage immigration dom-inated his last term in power and looks set to continue.

Police defuse WWII bomb in BerlinAP

BERLIN: Berlin police evac-uated thousands of people from a central area of the German capital yesterday and shut down the main train station as a precaution while they defused and removed an unexploded World War II bomb found during recent construction work.

Some 10,000 residents and workers were forced to leave the area, including the train station, while bomb experts defused the 500kg British bomb dropped during the war.

Trains were prevented from stopping at the busy station from 10am, and through traffic was shut down at 11:30am before experts began their work, German rail operator Deutsche

Bahn said. Some 300,000 travelers use the station daily.

Bomb disposal experts were able to successfully remove the detonator just after 1pm and destroy it in a small controlled explosion.

The evacuation area, a circle around the construction site north of the train station where the bomb was discovered during digging, also included a hospital, the new offices of Germany’s foreign intelligence service, and parts of both the economy and transportation ministries.

Chancellor Angela Merkel’s office and Germany’s parliament building are close by, but outside the zone.

Even 73 years after the end of the war, such discoveries remain common in major German cities.

Downtown Berlin was largely reduced to rubble in hundreds of Allied bombing raids during the war and street-to-street fighting between the Nazi and Soviet armies in the final days of the conflict.

Experts estimate that more than 5 percent of the bombs dropped on Berlin failed to explode due to a variety of reasons, including faulty fuses, poor assembly and bad angle of impact. The city estimates at least 3,000 bombs, grenades and other munitions are still buried.

They’re found frequently enough that they’re treated more as a nuisance than a major public safety issue, and author-ities are well trained and expe-rienced with their removal and destruction.

A member of German police addressing the journalists after the disposal operation of WWII bomb, in Berlin, yesterday.

Basque militant group announces dissolutionAP

MADRID: The Basque militant group ETA yesterday offered an unprecedented apology for the pain caused during its more than four decades of armed campaign for independence from Spain and France, and vowed not to return to violence.

ETA, which killed around 850 people including police, politicians and entrepreneurs, is due to announce its final dis-solution early next month, ending one of Europe’s last standing violent nationalist conflicts.

After nearly half a century of car bomb attacks, shootings and kidnappings, the group gave up its violent campaign in 2011. One year ago, the organisation also handed over to authorities most of its remaining arsenal.

In a statement published yesterday by Basque news-papers Berria and Gara, ETA acknowledged its responsibility for the pain caused by assassi-nations, torture, kidnappings and people forced to leave the Basque country, in a vague ref-erence not only to ETA’s victims but also to the plight of some of its own militants.

“We want to show our respect to the dead, the injured and the victims that ETA’s actions have caused,” the statement said. “We really are sorry.”

Spain’s government, which considers ETA a terrorist organ-isation, welcomed the

organisation’s move but said the apology came too late.

“ETA should have sincerely and unconditionally asked for forgiveness for the damage caused a long time ago,” the government of Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy said in a note.

It added that yesterday’s announcement was “nothing more than another consequence of the fortitude of the rule of law that has defeated ETA with the arms of democracy.”

ETA’s victims were also critical of the announcement because it sought the for-giveness of victims “who didn’t have a direct participation in the conflict” — apparently excluding those who had been specifically targeted by ETA.

AVT, a national association of terrorism victims, said the

statement aimed to “whiten” ETA’s past, while COVITE, another victim group based in the Basque town of San Sebastian, said the distinction between “guilty and innocent victims” treats them “as col-lateral damage in the imposition of a totalitarian project.”

ETA emerged in the late 1950s during the dictatorship of Gen Francisco Franco with the stated aim of forming an inde-pendent state from Basque areas on both sides of the Pyrenees. Basques have a distinct culture and an ancient language, Euskara.

In the 80s, shadowy death squads killed and tortured dozens of ETA militants in what was known as Spanish govern-ment’s “war” against the group.

Both France and Spain, where ETA committed most of its deadly actions, had been demanding an apology and that the group take a further step and disband.

In yesterday’s statement, ETA said it is committed “to finally overcome the conse-quences of the conflict and not to fall into its repetition,” adding that “this political and historical conflict should have had a fair and democratic solution a long time ago.”

There’s also an issue of what to do with the hundreds of jailed ETA members and the handful still on the run. Hundreds of killings also remain unsolved and the arms could help lead to some of the perpetrators.

Students seek tighter US gun lawREUTERS

LITTLETON: Thousands of students across the United States will mark the 19th anniversary of the massacre at Columbine High School yesterday by walking out of classes, in a show of unity aimed at pressuring politicians to enact tighter gun restrictions.

Students from more than 2,600 schools and institutions are expected to walk out of class at 10:00am local time, organ-isers said. They have been asked to observe a 13-second silence in honor of the victims killed at Columbine.

“This movement is here to stay. No more excuses. We want solutions,” organisers said on Facebook.

On April 20, 1999, two Columbine seniors rampaged through their school, killing 12 of their classmates and a teacher before committing suicide. Since then, mass shootings have occurred with shocking fre-quency across the United States.

In the latest gun violence to

hit a high school, one person was injured and a suspect was in custody after a shooting yes-terday morning at Forest High School in Marion County, Florida, police said.

“We can end the daily bloodshed in our country, and we can make history while doing it,” an organiser of

yesterday’s walkout, Max Cumming, wrote in an open letter to young Americans.

“We can rise up together and declare, with one ringing voice, that the age of national indif-ference towards the ever-growing death toll is over. We can change America forever, all before we reach 20 years of age.”

Three dead in Nicaragua pension reform protest

ETA acknowledged its responsibility for the pain caused by assassinations, torture, kidnappings and people forced to leave the Basque country, in a vague reference not only to ETA’s victims but also to the plight of some of its own militants.

American woman gets life sentence for shooting plot AP

HALIFAX: An American woman who plotted to go on a Valentine’s Day shooting rampage at a Canadian mall has been sentenced to life in prison with no chance of parole for a decade.

Lindsay Souvannarath of Illinois pleaded guilty last year to conspiracy to commit murder in a plan that involved two shooters who would have opened fire at a mall in Nova Scotia in 2015.

Nova Scotia Supreme Court Justice Peter Rosinski said yesterday that Souvan-narath is and will remain a threat.

He also said that if the plan to kill unsuspecting shoppers had not been inter-rupted by an anonymous tip and the quick actions of local police, it would have been carried out.

AGENCIES

MANAGUA: Police in Nica-ragua said that a police officer, protester, and pro-government activist have been killed in clashes over a planned social security reform.

Thousands of Nicaraguans took to the streets in protest for a second straight day on Thursday as discontent grew over controversial changes to social security that will increase worker and employer payments and reduce future pensions.

The protests grew in

intensity as pensioners were joined by businessmen and uni-versity students in several cities.

The National Police said the officer was killed by a shotgun blast and the protester died as a result of “a dispute between gangs.”

It said the activist was killed by a gunshot in Tipitapa, a city outside of the capital of Managua where supporters of the Sandinista government have been involved in clashes.

The government has ordered five independent TV channels that have been cov-ering the unrest off the air.

Students march to the US Capitol, as part of a nationwide walk-out of classes to mark the 19th anniversary of the Columbine High School mass shooting, in Washington, DC, yesterday.

Angela Merkel braces for tough talks with TrumpREUTERS

BERLIN: German Chancellor Angela Merkel faces difficult talks next Friday with US Pres-ident Donald Trump at a time when Washington and Berlin are at odds over a range of issues from trade to Iran, her transat-lantic coordinator said yesterday.

The cautious Merkel has failed to establish a good per-sonal rapport with Trump, and the mood music of her one-day working visit to the White House is likely to contrast sharply with that of French President Emmanuel Macron’s three-day state visit to the United States that also takes place next week.

Despite their big differences in age and political views, Macron, 40, a cerebral centrist,

gets on well with the 71-year-old right-wing Republican U.S. leader, whereas Merkel, 63, and Trump did not even speak for over five months before March 1.

“The visit definitely won’t be easy,” said Peter Beyer, a member of Merkel’s centre-right Christian Democratic Union (CDU), who has just taken over the role of transatlantic coordi-nator at a time of growing US-Europe tensions.

However, he dismissed any suggestion that Merkel would get inferior treatment to Macron, who arrives in the United States on Monday, or to Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, who has played golf with Trump.

“There is no time to be wasted on etiquette,” Beyer said of Merkel’s trip, adding: “To be honest, I can’t imagine the chan-cellor playing golf.”

“I think one has to see the Macron and Merkel visits as one,” he said. “Macron will take care of the nice pictures and play his role. Merkel will deliver the hard work and play hers.”

Merkel and Macron are working closely to reform the eurozone and strengthen the European Union as it tries to maintain a united front — despite the impending departure of Britain, one of its biggest member states — in the face of an increasingly protectionist Trump administration and an assertive Russia.

An exemption from US tariffs on steel and aluminium imports granted to the European Union expires on May 1.

“The trade issue is definitely the most pressing problem,” said Beyer.

“It is illusionary to solve all

problems by May 1. The goal must be on the one hand to reach an extension, and on the other the Europeans must of course be exempted from the US tariffs on steel and aluminium.”

Another hot topic will be a multinational Iran nuclear deal.

Trump has given the European signatories — Germany, France and Britain — a May 12 deadline to “fix the ter-rible flaws” of the 2015 nuclear deal, negotiated by the Obama administration, or he will refuse to extend US sanctions relief on Iran.

“The agreement is not at all as bad as Trump paints it,” said Beyer. “The world is better with than without agreements.”

Merkel must also convince Trump that Germany is deliv-ering in foreign and defence policy.

12 SATURDAY 21 APRIL 2018AMERICAS

16 nations agree to track Venezuela corruption: US officialsAP

WASHINGTON: Finance ministers from several Latin American nations as well as the US and Europe have agreed to work jointly to locate and seize the proceeds arising from corruption by Venezuelan government insiders, two US Treasury officials said.

The decision came at a Washington meeting earlier attended by Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin at which the finance officials from 16 nations also discussed ways to provide swift economic and humani-tarian assistance to Venezuela, including substantial debt relief,

in the event socialist President Nicolas Maduro is replaced by a government they deem more legitimate and committed to eco-nomic reform.

The two officials agreed to talk about the meeting only if not quoted by name because the dis-cussions were to be private. Offi-cials from France, Germany, Britain, Japan and all major Latin American nations participated in the meeting, which took place on the sidelines of the Interna-tional Monetary Fund’s spring meetings.

The IMF this week forecast Venezuela’s economy will shrink 15 percent in 2018, extending for a fifth year a recession that

already surpassed in size the US Great Depression. Inflation for the year is expected to soar to almost 14,000 percent.

“Concrete actions are nec-essary to restrict the ability of corrupt Venezuelan officials and their support networks from abusing the international financial system,” Mnuchin said in a statement after the meeting that provided few details on actions that were agreed on.

The two officials said a joint presentation by Colombia and the US described how top Ven-ezuelan officials operating through front companies siphoned off as much as 70 percent of funding for Maduro’s

hallmark program to alleviate hunger through the use of no-bid contracts, overbilling and the resale at black-market prices of food boxes assembled in Mexico. The presentation mapped in detail one network run out of Hong Kong and involving 30 shell companies spread across four continents, the officials said.

Maduro has consistently rejected US offers of humani-tarian assistance, considering them a veiled attempt to desta-bilize his rule.

He also blames financial sanctions imposed by the Trump administration for forcing the government to fall behind on repayment of its bonds and

exacerbating the country’s eco-nomic woes.

The officials said the goal in tracking graft in Venezuela is to seize and eventually return the stolen proceeds to the Vene-zuelan people in a post-Maduro scenario.

They said the participants also agreed to prevent Vene-zuela’s bankrupt government from liquidating at fire sale prices valuable overseas assets such as oil refineries and Houston-based petroleum company Citgo in a quest for fresh cash that would prolong the government’s hold on power.

In order to tighten the financial noose around Maduro

and his allies, the US officials said more countries must follow the lead of Panama, which recently blacklisted Maduro and dozens of top officials, considering them a “high risk” for money laundering.

The move sparked a quickly escalating feud that led Vene-zuela to kick out dozens of Pan-amanian companies and Panama to withdraw its ambassador from Venezuela.

“What Panama did was send a clear message that we want to protect our financial and logistics systems from illicit activities,” said Panamanian Finance Min-ister Dulcidio De La Guardia, who also attended the meeting.

Hundreds pay tributes to Barbara BushAP

HOUSTON: A spray of flowers covered the closed silver casket of former first lady Barbara Bush in the sanctuary of a Houston church as hundreds of mourners began arriving yesterday to pay their final respects.

People waited in line hours early for security screening before boarding shuttle buses to attend a public viewing at St. Martin’s Episcopal Church in Houston, where Bush and her husband, former President George H W Bush, regularly attended services.

Many women wore blue, Barbara Bush’s favourite color, and pearls, her go-to neckwear jewelry.

Lucy Orlando was one of the more than 100 people in line 90 minutes before bus service began, travelling from Weston, Florida, to pay her respects.

Originally from Haiti, the 74-year-old Orlando said has

admired Barbara Bush for many years, including her work in pro-moting literacy.

“She was a very sweet lady and she loves people,” said Orlando, who was carrying a gray suitcase containing framed photos of the couple and members of their family, including former Florida Gov Jeb Bush and former President George W Bush and his wife, Laura.

Jessica Queener, who works in special education and wears a cochlear implant to help with hearing loss, said Barbara Bush’s work in education and helping people with disabilities “really resonates with me on a personal level but also professionally.” Queener was in Houston from Washington, D.C., with her husband for work, and they decided to attend events hon-oring the former first lady, whom Queener also credits for being a positive influence on her husband when he signed the

Americans with Disabilities Act in 1990.

A hearse containing the former first lady’s casket arrived before daybreak at the Houston church, which is the nation’s largest Episcopal church. Her body was to be in repose from

noon until midnight. Among the officials allowed

in earlier were the Senate’s majority whip, Texas Sen John Cornyn, and Housing and Urban Development Secretary Ben Carson.

An invitation-only funeral is

set today. She will be buried later in the day behind her husband’s presidential library at Texas A&M University in a gated plot sur-rounded by trees and near a creek where the couple’s 3-year-old daughter, Robin, is buried. She died of leukaemia in 1953.

The members of the public visit former US first lady Barbara Bush as she lies in repose at St Martin’s Episcopal Church in Houston, Texas, yesterday.

Russia, Trump aides charged for vote conspiracyREUTERS

WASHINGTON: The Democratic Party sued Russia, Republican President Donald Trump’s campaign and WikiLeaks yesterday, charging that they conspired to disrupt the 2016 US presidential election, a court filing showed.

The party alleges in the federal lawsuit in Manhattan that top Trump campaign officials conspired with the Russian gov-ernment and its military spy agency to hurt Democratic pres-idential nominee Hillary Clinton and tilt the election to Trump by

hacking Democratic Party computers.

The lawsuit alleges that Trump’s campaign “gleefully wel-comed Russia’s help” in the 2016 election and accuses the Trump campaign of being a “racket-eering enterprise.”

Four US intelligence agencies reported last year that Russia sponsored the hacking of Demo-cratic Party groups and other actions during the 2016 cam-paign. Part of the effort was to benefit Trump over Clinton, the agencies said.

The Democratic National Committee blames Russia for

breaches of its computer systems in 2015 and the first half of 2016.

Hackers disseminated internal communications of party officials as the Democratic nom-inating convention got underway, and WikiLeaks released thou-sands of emails, some of which were embarrassing for the Clinton campaign.

The lawsuit names Donald Trump Jr, Trump associate Roger Stone and Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, as defendants.

Most of the accusations appeared to be based on news reports and publicly available legal documents and offered little

new information about alleged collusion with Moscow.

The White House did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Trump has repeatedly denied his campaign colluded with Russia.

Russia has denied meddling in the election.

The Republican National Committee, the Trump campaign, Trump campaign manager Michael Glassner, WikiLeaks, Stone and attorneys for Trump Jr, former campaign chairman Paul Manafort, Manafort associate Rick Gates and former campaign aide George Papadopoulos also did not

immediately respond to requests for comment.

The lawsuit, should it go forward, seems likely to help keep the spotlight on the issue of Russian election interference and possible collusion by the Trump campaign. Both are being inves-tigated by Special Counsel Robert Mueller, whose office declined to comment on the Democratic lawsuit.

Through the process of legal discovery, lawyers for the Dem-ocratic Party could force the defendants to produce documents they say relate to the collusion issue.

Board votes to raise tuition at Puerto Rico universityAP

SAN JUAN: A majority of federal control board members voted yesterday to more than double tuition at Puerto Rico’s largest public university despite heavy criticism the increase will make higher education unaffordable.

Six of seven members also voted to cut benefits at the Uni-versity of Puerto Rico and con-solidate 11 campuses that serve more than 58,000 students on an island mired in an 11-year recession.

“The (university) will no longer be able to afford its status quo operating model,” said Natalie Jaresko, executive director of the board created by US Congress.

Government and university officials vowed not to implement certain measures, a day after the board also moved to institute a 10 percent cut to Puerto Rico’s public pension

system, which is facing nearly $50bn in liabilities. Jaresko said those cuts are needed because the system is running out of money.

The university fiscal plan approved yesterday calls for increasing the undergraduate cost per credit from $57 to $115 by next year, and then to $157 by fiscal year 2023.

Darrell Hillman, interim president for the University of Puerto Rico, said that he had proposed $75 for next year and up to $140 within five years.

“This is like amputating an organ that is vital to the island of Puerto Rico,” he said, noting that families are still struggling in the aftermath of Hurricane Maria.

Board members approved a 10% cut in operating costs, called for a need-based schol-arship policy and increased various fees including gradu-ation rights from $27 to $80.

The lawsuit alleges that Trump’s campaign “gleefully welcomed Russia’s help” in the 2016 election and accuses the Trump campaign of being a “racketeering enterprise.”

Mexican Congress agrees to strip political immunity

Appeals for loved ones

AP

MEXICO CITY: The lower house of Mexico’s Congress has voted to remove the immunity from prosecution protection from every public office in the country.

The measure was approved without opposition and basically abolishes the impeachment process for offi-cials except the president.

Governors, mayors, law-makers and judges could all be automatically put on trial once indicted, but would be allowed to stay in office and not be jailed until convicted.

Under the constitutional changes approved on Thursday, the president could be tried while in office but only after a vote in Congress. According to current law, the president can be impeached and tried but only for a limited number of very serious offenses like treason.

“This bill will put an end to the impunity that prevails in Mexico’s political circles,” said Congressman Jesus Alvarez Lopez of the leftist Morena party.

Relatives and friends of three missing students from the University of Audiovisual Media, taking part in a demonstration demanding their loved ones to return alive, at the “Ninos heroes” roundabout, in Guadalajara, Jalisco State, Mexico, yesterday. Three film students from the University of Audiovisual Media of Jalisco state went missing on March 19.

Bruce Springsteen’s ‘Born to Run’ lyric sheet up for auctionAP

NEW YORK: Bruce Spring-steen’s songwriting scrawl is born to make bucks.

Sotheby’s said yesterday that it will auction a hand-written working manuscript of “Born to Run” in June. It’s being sold by an unidentified American collector.

The pre-sale estimate for the single sheet of notebook paper with 30 lines of writing is $200,000 to $300,000.

It will be offered in a books and manuscripts online auction from June 18 to 28.

Sotheby’s said many of the lines in this 1974 version are “apparently unpublished and unrecorded”.

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AFP

NEW YORK: The singer Janelle Monae yesterday announced the release of a dystopian film to accompany her first album in nearly five years, which was initially being produced by Prince.

Monae, who has increasingly focused on acting of late with roles in the Oscar-winning film “Moonlight” and the well-received Nasa history pic “Hidden Figures,” will roll out “Dirty Computer” on April 27. The 44-minute film, “Dirty Computer: an Emotion Picture by Janelle Monae,” will come out a day earlier and bring together music videos tied to the album, the singer said.

The film will air on the music and youth culture network MTV, African American-oriented entertainment network BET and their international partners. The “emotion picture” — which also stars “Selma” actress Tessa Thompson — features Monae playing a woman named Jane 57821 who lives in a totalitarian society where citizens are described as computers.

The film “explores humanity and what truly happens to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness when mind and machines merge, and when the gov-ernment chooses fear over freedom,” MTV and BET parent Viacom said in an announcement. Monae, 32, won acclaim starting with her musical debut a decade ago for her blending of classic soul and

jazz with psychedelic, science-fiction narratives. In an era in which female stars often maximise physical appeal, Monae casts a bookish figure and per-forms in customised tuxedos.

Monae had found a mentor in Prince who died suddenly two years ago from an accidental overdose of powerful pain-killers. In an interview with The New York Times Magazine, Monae said she had been working with the pop legend on “Dirty Computer” and shelved the

project temporarily after his death.“I just never could imagine a time

where I couldn’t pick up the phone or email him, and he’d contact me right back and we’d talk about all these things that I was unsure of,” she said. Monae has already released three tracks from the album including “Django Jane,” a rap track on which she hits back at threats she has received as a prominent advocate for the Black Lives Matter movement for civil rights.

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Janelle Monae attending the 2018 Vanity Fair Oscar Party following the 90th Academy Awards at The Wallis Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts in Beverly Hills, California.

Janelle Monae plans dystopian film Ants that ‘explode’ to fight foes discoveredAFP

KUALA LUMPURL: A species of ant that “explodes” and gives off a toxic, sticky liquid to fight off foes and keep its colony safe has been discovered in the jungles of Borneo island, scientists said yesterday.

The creatures, which have the scientific name Colobopsis explodens, were found by a team of researchers in the tiny state of Brunei, which inhabits a sliver of land in the north of the biodiverse island.

When threatened by other insects, worker ants can rupture the wall of their body, which leads to their death and the release of a yellow toxin from their glands that either kills or holds off enemies, according to the study.

The scientists from Austria, Thailand and Brunei said the existence of a broad grouping of “exploding” ants was already known, but they had managed to identify several specific species in the course of their research.

Cow may be biggest mammal if humans keep up extinctionsREUTERS

OSLO: The spread of humans around the world from Africa thousands of years ago wiped out big mammals in a shrinking trend that could make the cow the biggest mammal on Earth in a few centuries’ time, a scientific study said on Thursday.

The spread of hominims — early humans and relatives such as Nean-derthals — from Africa coincided with the extinction of mammals such as the mammoths, sabre-toothed tiger and glyptodon, an armadillo-like creature the size of a car. “There is a very clear

pattern of size-biased extinction that follows the migration of hominims out of Africa,” lead author Felisa Smith of the University of New Mexico said of the study published in the journal Science. Humans apparently targeted big species for meat, while smaller creatures such as rodents escaped, according the report examining trends over 125,000 years.

In North America, for instance, the mean body mass of land-based mammals has shrunk to 7.6 kg (17 lbs) from 98.0 after humans arrived.

If the trend continues “the largest mammal on Earth in a few hundred

years may well be a domestic cow at about 900kg” (2,000 lbs), the US team wrote. That would mean the loss of creatures including elephants, giraffes and hippos. In March, the world’s last male northern white rhino died in Kenya.

But other research casts doubt on a continued shrinking of mammals, partly because of conservation efforts to stave off threats to wildlife such as climate change, loss of forest habitats and pollution and expanding cities.

Thomas Brooks, chief scientist of the International Union for Conser-vation of Nature (IUCN) who was not

involved in the study, said the pro-jection of ever smaller mammals was “doom and gloom.” “Happily I don’t think it’s very likely,” he said, saying that other research suggests that large animals such as elephants are more likely to benefit in protected areas than smaller ones.

And a Red List of threatened species, maintained by the IUCN, also lists some wild mammals roughly the size of a cow — such as the African buffalo or the brown bear — as unen-dangered. The Science study also excludes marine mammals such as the blue whale.

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