Battle for second place hots up in QSL

BUSINESS | 21 SPORT | 29

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Emir H H Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in Istanbul yesterday. The Emir is in the Turkish city to take part in the 13th Session of the Islamic Summit Conference that starts today.

Emir meets Erdogan

THURSDAY 14 APRIL 2016 • 7 Rajab 1437 • Volume 21 • Number 6766 thepeninsulaqatar @peninsulaqatar @peninsula_qatar

Payments at Women’s

Hospital go cashlessThe Peninsula

DOHA: Hamad Medical Corporation (HMC) has introduced cashless payment system for outpatient appointments at Women’s Hospital.

Patients going to Women’s Hospital for appointments will now need to pay by credit, debit or e-cash card — a new card available at Qatar National Bank for QR20. The card can be topped up and used to pay for government services.

Patients that have appointments for consultations or ultrasonography will be able to pay at the counter they reg-ister at, instead of visiting the cashier. The cashless system will also allow any subsequent payments for services to be taken at the registration counter. This method will also apply to pharmacy, allowing patients to retrieve and pay for their prescriptions more efficiently.

Professor Mike Richmond, Acting CEO of Women’s Hos-pital said: “By eliminating a step in the payment process, we hope to save valuable time for the women and families visiting our facilities. As our patients are familiar with pay-ing in cash, we will implement this new system in a phased approach, which will give people the opportunity to adapt to the change.”

Intelligence Qatar will help Women’s Hospital take feed-back from their patients about the cashless system after implementation, allowing the hospital to streamline their processes.

→ Continued on page 3

Cabinet move to boost private sector role

The Peninsula

DOHA: The State Cabinet yester-day approved a draft decision on formation of a ministerial group to promote participation of private sector in economic development projects.

The cabinet, in its weekly meet-ing at Emiri Diwan chaired by Prime Minister and Interior Minister H E Sheikh Abdullah bin Nasser bin Kha-lifa Al Thani also approved a draft decision to set up a technical com-mittee with the same objective.

The ministerial committee will be chaired by the Minister of Econ-omy and Commerce and will have the ministers of Finance, Transport and Communications, and Munici-pality and Environment as members.

The panel will be responsible for identifying areas for participation of government and private sectors in economic development projects, development of policies, standards,

controls and programs to encour-age private sector participation in such projects. The committee will also follow up on implementation of the projects and develop necessary solutions to overcome the difficulties and obstacles hindering the process.

The Technical Committee to Stimulate Private Sector Partici-pation in Economic Development Projects will be set up at the Minis-try of Economy and Commerce.

The committee will be headed by a representative of the Minis-try of Economy and Commerce and will have representatives from other authorities concerned as members. It will support the functions of the ministerial group.

The panel will submit proposals on fields and projects for partici-pation of government and private sectors in economic development projects, and suggest ways to sup-port and encourage the private sector in this regard. The Cabi-net also approved a draft decision of the Minister of Education and Higher Education on implementa-tion of some provisions of Law No. (18) of 2015 regulating the practice of educational services.

The draft decision specifies areas of educational services in addition to the areas provided in Article (1) of the Law as follows:

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Al Kawari hits out at racial discrimination By Mohamed Iqbal

The Peninsula

DOHA: Acting against racial dis-crimination is a step towards achieving lasting peace between nations, because racial discrimina-tion has always entailed disunion, rivalry and confusion in societies,

says H E Dr Hamad bin Abdulaziz Al Kawari, Cultural Adviser to the Emiri Diwan and Qatar’s candidate for the post of Unesco Director General.

In a speech at Mandela Hall in Johannesburg, during his recent visit to South Africa, in the pres-ence of diplomats, political, cultural and media figures, Dr Al Kawari paid tributes to anti-Apartheid hero Nelson Mandela describing him as

an inspiring role model for peo-ple around the world in his struggle against Apartheid.

“I am pleased to convey to you on behalf of Emir H H Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, and the people of Qatar, their highest esteem for your wonderful country and the courageous example it set under the leadership of Nelson Mandela, who became an inspiring role model for people around

the world in his struggle against Apart-heid, construction after liberation and embrace of tolerance and peaceful values. I would also like to praise the bilateral relations between our coun-tries at the political, economic and cultural levels and the positive impact it has had on laying the foundation for dialogue and peace,” Al Kawari told the gathering.

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Cabinet also approves draft decision to set up technical committee.

BUS

w

Qatar keen to strengthen SME sector: Minister

Prime Minister and Interior Minister H E Sheikh Abdullah bin Nasser bin Khalifa Al Thani yesterday met a delegation of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) taking part in the 12th Annual Meeting of International Network for Small and Medium Enterprises in Doha. He hoped that constructive outcomes would be reached during panel discussions to contribute to enhancing expertise exchange and cooperation to serve the advancement of SMEs locally and globally.

Premier meets SMEs delegation

HOME02 THURSDAY 14 APRIL 2016

By Raynald C Rivera The Peninsula

DOHA: Doha Bus, Qatar’s first Hop-on, Hop-off open-top sightseeing bus tour, has launched a night tour service where residents and tourists can see the city’s iconic land-marks and impressive skyline in the evening.

Lasting 90 minutes, the ‘once round’ tour starts from Souq Waqif at 7.30pm and continues to the Corniche to

West Bay, providing guests with the opportunity to see the beauty of Doha at night. The tour includes an inform-ative audio commentary in seven languages, including Arabic, English, Korean, Brazilian, Japanese, Chinese and German on the city’s highlights and history.

A complimentary cup of hot karak, one of Qatar’s sig-nature drinks, is served to guests.

“Doha Bus is pleased to have added the night tour to its growing list of local offerings and this is a unique way to see the city. By starting at Souq Waqif and exploring key destinations along the Corniche and around Doha, vis-itors are able to see our city’s wonderful diversity,” said Khalid Alsuwaidi, CEO, Doha Bus.

Night tour ticket costs QR45 (child), QR95 (adult) and QR235 (family) and is valid for 24 hours.

In addition to the existing daytime city tours and night tour, Doha Bus has introduced a Qatar Foundation (QF) route that takes passengers through the ultra-modern and urban landscape of Education City, covering sites, includ-ing Al Shaqab Equestrian Centre and Mathaf Arab Museum of Modern Art. With these new additions to the QF route, the tour is constantly expanding with over 22 stops.

Doha Bus Services will further expand with the soon-to-launch Sealine Beach Resort shuttle with paired weekend packages and Monster Truck bus trips into the sand dunes and speedboat sight-seeing trips from Museum of Islamic Art. Doha Bus also provides school, corporate and group tours at very competitive prices.

Doha Bus launches night tour

Doha Bus takes media on a night tour. Pic: Salim / The Peninsula

HOME 03 THURSDAY 14 APRIL 2016

Continued from page 1

He said that racial discrimination has taken on new forms, hiding behind sectarian ideologies that made room for further hatred and calls for ethnic and cultural cleansing.

“We have, in our contemporary world, concrete evi-dence of such acts, which includes widespread hatred, destruction of human heritage and incitement to reject others,” said Al Kawari.

“These indications can be found in the consequences of campaigns falsely launched in the name of religion, and implemented as a form of slavery based on ethnic and religious grounds.

“They can also be found in the consequences of the global refugee crisis that has unfortunately been used as an excuse for the spreading of intolerance, hatred and incitement for war between civilizations,” he added.

Al Kawari said that Unesco has diligently fought against racism and racial discrimination since its incep-tion. From its earliest beginnings, it did not refrain from conducting intensive research and study on this subject, and took a lead role against racism in 1976, at its General Conference, with a Declaration against Racism and Racial intolerance in order to further combat racism through education, communication and the establishment of laws.

Global Citizenship Education is a creative tool that can promote understanding among human beings and strengthen dialogue between cultures, as cultural heritage is a form of soft power that helps to immunize communi-ties and build bridges of communication between human beings regardless of their race, language and beliefs, said Al Kawari.

However, cultural understanding requires tools for raising greater awareness and sensitizing people towards the consequences of “the Culture of Death and Hatred”.

Perhaps the steps taken by Unesco to spread aware-ness need qualitative efforts to invest even further, in a creative manner, such as with the International Dec-ade for the Rapprochement of Cultures (2013-2022) and

the International Decade for People of African Descent (2015-2024).

The international coalition of cities united against racism is an example of sharing experiences to further educate people against racism. “I am proud of this his-toric moment and I am proud to be standing here on this land, where values of tolerance and fraternity have been exemplified within the framework of diversity and mutual respect.

“I feel that my presence among you provides my can-didacy for the position of Unesco Director-General with a deep resonating humility and an appreciation for all cul-tures that follow your enlightened example.

“I strongly believe that in my future role I will be able to promote educational and cultural initiatives, which, in their turn, will continue to spread prosperity and devel-opment amongst the wonderful people of South Africa,” he concluded.

Continued from page 1

“So far, we have piloted the cashless system with great success at our Bone and Joint Centre. We believe this change has enhanced the patient experience and we are looking forward to implementing this system across

all of our facilities in the near future,” said Professor Richmond. Along with HMC’s Bone and Joint Centre, the cashless system has been introduced at other government facilities including Primary Health Care Corporation, the Traffic Department and the General Directorate of Bor-ders Passports and Expatriates Affairs.

H E Dr Hamad bin Abdulaziz Al Kawari, Cultural Adviser to the Emiri Diwan and Qatar’s candidate for Unesco Director-General’s post, speaking at Mandela Hall in Johannesburg.

Cashless ‘system at Bone and Joint Centre a success’

Al Kawari to promote cultural and educational initiatives

HOME04 THURSDAY 14 APRIL 2016

The Peninsula

DOHA: The number of Saudi tourists visiting Qatar in the first quarter of this year increased by 16 percent to 280,255 compared to the same period last year, Qatar Tourism Authority (QTA) said yesterday.

The first quarter of 2016 saw an 11 percent increase in the number of visitors to Qatar from all GCC countries (403,023) compared to the first quarter of 2015 (361,660), with most of the growth generated by Saudi Arabia.

“Saudi Arabia tops our source markets in terms of its current size and rate of growth over the past five years.

“In the first quarter of 2016, the number of Saudi visitors increased by 16 percent (280,255) compared to the same period in 2015

(241,008),” said Rashed Al Qurese, Chief Mar-keting and Promotions Officer, QTA.

“This is due in large part to our shared language and heritage, which allows tourists from Saudi Arabia to enjoy the excitement of visiting a luxury destination while feeling at home and ensuring their families are com-fortable,” he added.

“We will continue to build on this position-ing, especially as we near the summer events popular among GCC tourists, including Eid celebrations in Qatar and Qatar Summer Fes-tival,” he said.

Last year, 1.3 million visitors from the GCC came to Qatar, marking a 16 percent increase from 2014 and following a large-scale pro-motional drive that involved road shows in Gulf countries. Over 160 travel agents in the region completed QTA’s online TAWASH train-ing programme, which aims to equip travel agents with knowledge of Qatar’s landmarks and unique tourism offerings.

As interest in Qatar among Saudi tourists and travel agents grows, QTA is stepping up efforts to tap into the market through a strong presence at the Riyadh Travel Fair it is join-ing for the first time as a strategic partner. The Qatar delegation, led by QTA, includes 18 co-exhibitors representing a cross section of Qatar’s tourism sector.

According to Al Qurese, the fair provides

an important platform to capitalise on the strong demand from the Saudi market to rein-force Qatar’s position as the destination of choice for Saudi consumers and travel agents.

He said the fair provides a unique oppor-tunity for QTA and its partners to engage directly with consumers looking for their next holiday destination, in addition to travel agents and other professionals in the leisure tourism industry. This is Qatar Destination Brand’s first appearance in Riyadh and being introduced through a newly designed stand and renewed emphasis on Qatar’s offering as a world-class destination with deep cultural roots.”

The fair until tomorrow expects to receive about 20,000 visitors. More than 55 countries are represented through 219 exhibitors.

Co-exhibitors at QTA’s stand (Stand E-1) include: Kempinski Marsa Malaz; Qatar Inter-national Adventures; Marriott Marquis City Centre Doha Hotel; InterContinental Doha - The City; Crown Plaza Doha - The Business Park; Holiday Villa Hotel & Residence; Sap-phire Plaza Hotel Doha; Warwick Doha Hotel; Grand Heritage Doha Hotel & Spa; Somerset West Bay Hotel; Al Sultan Beach Resort; CORP Executive Hotel Doha; Acon Travel; Amari Doha; Concord Hotel Doha; Doha Downtown Hotel Apartment; Westin Doha Hotel & Spa; and Sheraton Grand Doha Resort & Conven-tion Hotel.

The Peninsula

DOHA: The Ministry of Economy and Commerce, in collaboration with Mannai Trading Com-pany, dealer of Cadillac vehicles, has announced the recall of Cadillac ATS 2013-2015 models due to a defect in the coil antenna module that powers the rear defogger system in the driver side rear pillar.

The ministry said the recall is part of efforts to protect consumers and ensure dealers fol-low up on vehicle defects and repairs. The minis-try said it will coordinate with the dealer to follow up on maintenance and repairs and communicate with customers to ensure repairs are carried out.

It urged customers to report any violations to its Consumer Protection and Anti-Commercial Fraud Department through call centre: 16001; email: info@mec.gov.qa; Twitter: @MEC_Qatar; Instagram: MEC_Qatar; and the minis-try’s mobile app for Android and IOS: MEC_Qatar

Cadillac ATS

2013-2015

models recalled

By Sanaullah Ataullah

The Peninsula

DOHA: Qatar Green Building Coun-cil (QGBC) has received good response from local companies for its ongoing campaign to reduce the use of paper in offices.

The council provided training to 150 company staff to rationalise paper consumption at their premises. The

number of participants registered at the council grew from 20 at the begin-ning of the drive to 55 this year. They are from consultancy firms, hotels, schools, government organisations and construction companies, among others

Details were given by Meshal Al Shamari, Director, QGBC, at an event yesterday to mark the achievements of this year’s ‘No Paper Day Qatar’ cam-paign. The day was observed by QGBC on April 7 with a call to companies and the public to conserve paper.

The event was attended by repre-sentatives of participating companies, who shared experiences to push the drive ahead. Many companies who marked the day were honoured by the council.

“We are continuing a nation-wide campaign through channels, including social media, to make Qatar paper-efficient, said Al Meshal.

“The campaign was launched three years ago whereby it was noted that five million paper sheets were

used a day in Qatar. When we calcu-lated, it was some 2bn sheets a year. It was too much so we thought to create awareness among people and com-panies to reduce paper use.”

Participants are asked to stop printing rough draft, use both sides of the paper and reuse papers as much as possible, among other effi-cient ways to rationalise use.

Paper conservation in offices will not only help protect the environment but also boost administrative opera-tions, said Al Meshal.

“We usually print 2,500 papers for our official works, including

invoices and communications. But on April 7, we managed to slash at few hundred printed papers responding to the paper conservation day,” said Kuruvila Manipadam, a representa-tive of Movenpick Doha hotel.

“Our General Manager Ghada Sadet is very strict with regard to paper waste and leads the conser-vation drive in the office. We are asked to convince customers to take invoices through email. We are also educating our clients about the drive. Most of them happily agreed to support us. “We have joined the drive since the beginning. Paper

consumption has decreased at least by five percent in our hotel, thanks to the drive. We targeted 20 percent. It is not easy but I am sure we will achieve gradually,” he added.

“We stopped printing rough drafts for communications and began printing on both sides of the sheet,” said Salman, a representative of SNC-Lavalin ProFac Gulf Management which operates Msheireb projects.

“We need to print a large number of papers daily. Following the cam-paign, we have become some seven percent efficient and are doing hard to further cut paper use.”

GCC visitors up 11% in Q1 Number of Saudi tourists visiting Qatar increased by 16 percent to 280,255 this year compared to the same period last year.

Saudi visitors arriving in Qatar.

QGBC campaign to reduce paper use in offices receives good response

Qatar Green Building Council officials with participants honoured for achievements during ‘No Paper Day Qatar’ campaign, yesterday. Pic: Baher / The Peninsula

HOME 05THURSDAY 14 APRIL 2016

QNA

DOHA: Qatar Development Fund (QDF) yesterday signed a $50m grant agreement to contribute to the capi-tal of The Lives and Livelihoods Fund (LLF) established by Islamic Devel-opment Bank (IDB) and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

Assistant Foreign Minister for Foreign Affairs H E Sultan bin Saad Al Meraikhi and other officials were present at the deal signing ceremony.

The grant facility known as LLF was launched to address poverty and diseases in IDB member countries.

Through the innovative facility, IDB, the foundation and other donors will support over five years poverty-focused programmes worth $2.5bn in IDB member countries, especially in low-income countries.

The agreement was signed by Khalifa bin Jassim Al Kuwari, General Director, QDF; Dr Ahmad Mohamed Ali Al Madani, First Pres-ident, IDB; and Bill Gates, Co-chair, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

Al Kuwari expressed pleasure

with the contribution of $50m at the beginning of the pilot project, which will support millions of people to get out of poverty in Islamic countries in dire need of help.

He said LLF aims to develop primary healthcare, disease con-trol, smallholder agriculture and basic rural infrastructure. “We aim to reach 30 least developed mem-ber countries of Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) in Asia and Africa,” he said, adding the project will have a significant role in the advancement of these peoples. He hoped more donors will take part in the initiative to reach $500m by the beginning of next year.

Qatar believes that human development, healthcare, education and the agricultural sector play a big role in the activation of the produc-tion process in developing countries, he said. Al Kuwari said the project is one of LLF’s innovative ones and its partners have significant field experiences in the targeted sectors. He also expressed optimism about the project and said he looked for-ward to greater cooperation in the next stage.

QDF signs $50m agreement

for advancement of

low-income Islamic countries

By Sidi Mohamed

The Peninsula

DOHA: The Health Control Section at Al Rayyan Municipality yesterday seized 22 tonnes of rice unfit for human con-sumption, in Ain Khaled.

The bags, whose production date had expired since 2013, 2014 and 2015, con-tained insects due to their storage for a long time in an unlicensed store, which had also been kept in a poor condition.

An official of the municipality told this daily: “A week ago, we received information from community sources about suspicious activities in the store,

which belongs to a company.”After one week of investigations and

follow-up, the municipality received accurate information about the store and obtained inspection permit from Public Prosecution. A raid followed in collab-oration with Al Saad Police, the official said. About 6am yesterday, inspectors inspected the store and seized a large number of rice bags.

Municipality inspectors also impounded equipment and plastic con-tainers used in repackaging rice and printing new validity dates on the bags, in violation of the Ministry of Municipal-ity laws. Such a violation attracts a fine of QR15,000 and permanent closure of the erring outlet, according to the law.

The Peninsula

DOHA: The ninth edition of IWED wedding exhibition organised by Qatar Expo will be held at Katara Hall from April 26 to 30.

More than 70 exhibitors from Qatar, the GCC and India will show-case the best wedding products and services in Doha. Potential custom-ers and businesses from Qatar and the region with keen interest in bridal industry will have the opportunity at IWED 2016 to meet top fashion designers, caterers, wedding planners and travel agencies offering compet-itive honeymoon packages.

Hadi Alzain Ali, Qatar Expo Chief Executive Officer said: “IWED 2016 has become an international desti-nation showcasing the latest trends in global wedding industry for all people in the Qatari society. We are keen to host this event annually in Qatar because of the high demand

we have encountered from the public for specialized wedding services and the continuous growth in the wed-ding industry.”

On the last day of the exhibition,

Katara Hall will run a prize draw for a free wedding ceremony. The lucky winner will be selected randomly from the list of registered visitors.

IWED 2016 is expected to attract

thousands of local and regional vis-itors, and will feature a daily fashion show by famous designers, enter-tainment programs and creative presentations.

Assistant Foreign Minister for Foreign Affairs H E Sultan bin Saad Al Meraikhi with Khalifa bin Jassim Al Kuwari, General Director, QDF; Dr Ahmad Mohamed Ali Al Madani, First President, IDB; and Bill Gates, Co-chair, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, at the deal signing ceremony.

IWED wedding expo from April 26

Civic inspectors checking one of the rice bags in the store.

22 tonnes of expired rice

seized in Ain Khaled

Officials highlighting the event to be held at Katara Hall from April 26 to 30.

HOME06 THURSDAY 14 APRIL 2016

The Peninsula

DOHA: A hospital group in Qatar has offered `50,000 (about QR2,750) ex-gratia for the next of kin of those killed in the firework dis-aster, which has so far claimed 110 lives and left 383 injured at a temple in the southern Indian state of Kerala, a top official from the hospital group said.

“It’s painful to learn that hundreds have been killed and many are bat-tling for life following the fireworks accident.

“Our group will give `50,000 (about QR2,750) ex-gratia to the next of kin of those killed in the fire-work disaster and jobs to the victims’ family mem-bers in our hospitals in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries,” Dr K T Mohammed Rabeeh Rab-iullah, Chairman, Naseem Al Rabeeh Healthcare group, told the media.

The group has three centres in Qatar — Naseem Al Rabeeh Medical Centre, C Ring Road; Premium

Naseem Al Rabeeh, Mamoura; and Al Rabeeh Dental Centre, Al Rawabi Street, Muntaza.

The fourth — Naseem Al Rabeeh Rayyan — is going to open in coming month. A multi-special-ity hospital project will be announced soon this year.

In one of the worst tragedies to have hit Ker-ala, the major fire engulfed the 100-year-old Puttin-gal Devi Temple complex in Kollam district in Ker-ala during a display of fireworks.

Naseem Al Rabeeh Healthcare

group offers help to victims

of India temple fire disaster

The Peninsula

DOHA: British Ambassador to Qatar, Ajay Sharma, yesterday joined around 1,000 guests of the Brit-ish embassy to celebrate the 90th birthday of Queen Elizabeth II and the strong partnership between the UK and Qatar. The Guests of Hon-our were Minister of Education and Higher Education H E Dr Mohammed Abdul Wahed Al Hammadi and Min-ister of Municipality, Urban Planning and Environment H E Mohammed bin

Abdullah Al Rumeihi.Sharma also welcomed sen-

ior Qatari figures from business, government, culture and sport, the diplomatic corps and members of the British and international com-munities. They were entertained by the Qatar Armed Forces band and Doha Jazz.

He said: “I was delighted that so many of the embassy’s friends and contacts were able to attend the Queen’s Birthday Party tonight in honour of UK’s longest serving mon-arch H M Queen Elizabeth II.

“Everyone knows the UK has a

historically close relationship with Qatar, but we want to celebrate not only the past but also to look ahead to the future. This is a relationship based not only on shared economic and security interests, but also on the strong and warm personal con-nections established over the years between Qatari and British people.

“In the coming years we look for-ward to continuing to work together closely in the fields of diplomacy and security, business, service, education, culture and tourism; and strengthen-ing further the relationship between our citizens.”

The Peninsula

DOHA: Qatar Airways’ (QA) premium in-flight services have proven again to be a favourite with global travellers as the international airline has been awarded two best-in-class accolades at the TravelPlus awards in Hamburg, Germany.

QA received TravelPlus Airline Gold Awards; the first for its signature Missoni sleeper suits and its recently launched Hasbro children’s activity pack.

Rossen Dimitrov, Senior Vice- President, Customer Experience, QA, said: “We are very proud once again to be honoured for delivering outstanding customer experience for all our passengers travelling together with QA. Both awards recognise the airline’s high quality service and standing as a world-class airline.

“From first class luxuries to fam-ily fun, our in-flight amenities are designed to make every passenger’s journey more comfortable and add a special touch by becoming great sou-venirs of their flight with QA.”

QA released a fun video show-ing Mr. Potato Head heading off on his holidays to celebrate the new on

board activity sets and meal boxes, it can be viewed at https://youtu.be/LjgpMA__fJ0

QA won gold in last year’s Travel-Plus Awards for its exclusive Italian designer Giorgio Armani fragrances and Beauty First Class Male amen-ity kit and the Business Class Middle East amenity kit. Assessment for the acclaimed industry awards focuses on wishes and needs of travellers, with selection criteria adhering to trend, pleasure, luxury, usabil-ity and style, all from a traveller’s perspective.

Renowned for its hospitality, QA offers First Class passengers on over-night flights stylish and luxurious sleeper suits and slippers designed by Italian fashion house Missoni. The sleepwear offers comfort and

promotes relaxation throughout pas-sengers’ journeys.

The award-winning airline launched its new children’s activ-ity pack on board its worldwide network this January in partner-ship with Hasbro Gaming to provide more entertainment for its youngest guests. The new kits offer more levels of interactivity and playability, fea-turing Mr. Potato Head plush toys and Hasbro Gaming brand board games, known for their suite of leading fam-ily entertainment properties.

Featured titles include the world’s favourite family gaming brand, Monopoly, and long-standing classics such as Twister, Guess Who and Con-nect 4. The activity kits are available on board and have been developed for children aged 0-2 and 3-12 years.

Four kits, each featuring a differ-ent game, are available to families flying to and from Doha on long-and short-haul flights. Young travellers can explore and play with glow-in-the-dark toys and stickers, interactive bags and a gadget stand. Kits for infants include a peek-a-boo Mr. Potato Head plush toy and soft books.

Children-friendly meals can be pre-ordered and are served in vibrant and reusable Monopoly or Mr. Potato Head collectable meal boxes.

Gold awards recognise Qatar Airways’ premium sleeper suits and children’s activity kit.

QA wins double accolades at TravelPlus Awards

The Peninsula

DOHA: Vodafone Qatar has announced that it is offering iPhone SE, the most powerful phone with a four-inch display.

iPhone SE packs the power of iPhone 6s in a beloved compact aluminium design customers love, featuring a stunning four-inch Retina display and four gorgeous metallic finishes, including rose gold.

With the exceptional perform-ance of the advanced 64-bit A9 chip, longer battery life, camera innova-tions including a 12-megapixel iSight camera, Live Photos, the ability to record in 4K and Touch ID, iPhone SE is the perfect phone for everyone who wants a smaller phone.

Vodafone is thrilled to offer iPhone customers affordable data

bundles that will ensure a great data experience over its fast and robust

network. Postpaid customers get 15GB of free data per month for three months, while Vodafone Prepaid cus-tomers will get 6GB of free data for 90 days.

“Customers looking for an incred-ible mobile experience will be extremely impressed with iPhone SE on Vodafone’s superfast network,” said Luke Longney, Director of Mar-keting, Vodafone Qatar.

“Our data-packed offers are the perfect complement to the power-ful iPhone SE and we’re thrilled to offer this choice to customers,” Long-ney added.

Customers can purchase iPhone SE at Vodafone’s flagship stores located in Villaggio, Landmark Mall and City Center Mall or online via the company eShop on www.vodafone.qa/iPhoneSE. For more information on iPhone, please visit www.apple.com/iphone.

Vodafone offers iPhone SE with free data

iPhone SE is the most powerful phone with a four-inch display.

Dr K T Mohammed Rabeeh Rabiullah, Chairman, Naseem Al Rabeeh Healthcare group,

Officials at the event.

Queen Elizabeth’s 90th birthday marked

HOME / MIDDLE EAST 07THURSDAY 14 APRIL 2016

Jordan shuts Brotherhood headquarters

AFP

AMMAN: Jordanian security serv-ices yesterday closed the Amman headquarters of the Muslim Brother-hood, the country’s main opposition force, which denounced the move as politically motivated.

Previously tolerated for decades in Jordan, the Brotherhood has had tense relations with the authorities since the Arab Spring uprisings that shook the region in 2011.

“Jordanian security searched the headquarters of the Muslim Brother-hood and evacuated it before sealing off the entrance with red wax,” said a lawyer for the group, Abdelkader Al Khatib.

“This is clearly a political deci-sion in line with what is happening in the region,” he added.

A security source said that the movement’s headquarters were “closed on the order of the gover-nor of the capital as the Brotherhood did not obtain legal authorisation” for its activities.

The authorities view the Broth-erhood as an illegal organisation because its licence was not renewed in accordance with a political par-ties law adopted in 2014.

The Jordanian branch of the movement, which was formed in Egypt in 1928 and has affiliates across the region, has wide grass-roots support in the kingdom.

The intervention of the secu-rity services “has the sole purpose of influencing the upcoming elec-tions and results”, Khatib said.

Jordan is expected to hold leg-islative elections by early next year. The Brotherhood boycotted previous elections in 2013 and 2010, crying foul. The Brotherhood’s second-in-command in Jordan, Zaki Bani Rsheid, was sentenced to 18 months in prison in February 2015 for criti-cising a decision by the United Arab Emirates to blacklist the organisa-tion. In Egypt, it has been blacklisted as a “terrorist group” and the author-ities have cracked down hard on its members, including ousted Islamist president Mohamed Mursi who has been sentenced to death.

Hundreds of Mursi’s supporters have been killed and tens of thou-sands jailed since he was ousted by the army in 2013.

The Jordanian branch of the Brotherhood accuses the authorities of trying to exploit divisions within the organisation.

Last year, the government authorised the formation of a break-away group known as the Muslim Brotherhood Association.

Kuwait to deploy

national guard

at oil facilities

AFP

KUWAIT CITY: Kuwait was to deploy national guard units to run and protect some oil facilities after workers announced a major strike for this weekend, a news-paper said.

The units would start working at facilities in the oil-rich south-ern region, Al Rai said, citing unnamed sources. The oil work-ers’ union decided to begin an open-ended strike from Sunday after a dispute with the govern-ment over proposed pay cuts. Hit by the sharp drop in crude prices, Kuwait is introducing a new pay-roll scheme for public employees and wants to include the 20,000 oil workers, which would mean cut in wages and incentives.

Anatolia

BEIRUT: Yesterday, the Lebanese people marked the anniversary of the start of the civil war that plunged their country into vio-lence and chaos for 15 years.

More than 25 years after the conflict ended, however, the Leb-anese people have yet to enjoy domestic tranquility.

The older generations who remember the war hope to never see such dark days again, urging the nation’s youth to put sectar-ian and ideological differences aside.

In Beirut, many buildings still bear the scars of the gunfire and shelling that once ravaged the city known as the “Paris of the Mid-dle East”.

Saeed Shams Al Din, a 58-year-old engineer who remem-bers the war, described the conflict as “one of the worst in history”.

The Lebanese people had borne the brunt of the civil war, Shams Al Din told Anadolu Agency, going on to urge the nation’s youth to remain in the country and strive to maintain peace.

Graffiti on a bullet-riddled building in Lebanese capital Beirut to mark the 41st anniversary yesterday of Lebanon’s civil war (1975-1990).

Decades after turmoil, Lebanese pine for peaceDecision to close office of group with grassroots support in the kingdom seen to be political.

Al Sisi defends islands handoverAP

CAIRO: Egypt’s president yesterday sought to defuse a storm stirred up by his government’s declared intention to hand over control of two strate-gic Red Sea islands to Saudi Arabia, arguing that he did not surrender Egyptian territory.

President Abdel Fattah Al Sisi also reiterated Cairo’s position that Egyptian security forces had nothing to do with the torture and killing of an Italian doctoral student abducted in Cairo, an incident that has poi-soned ties with Italy. Rome recalled its ambassador to Cairo in protest of what it called a lack of coopera-tion by Egyptian authorities in the investigation.

Egypt’s government maintains that the islands of Tiran and Sanafir at the mouth of the Gulf of Aqaba belong to Saudi Arabia, which asked Egypt in 1950 to protect them from Israel. Israel captured the islands in the 1967 Middle East war, but handed them back to Egypt under their 1979

peace treaty. “We did not surrender our rights, but we restored the rights of others,” Al Sisi said in comments broadcast live. “Egypt did not relin-quish even a grain of sand.”

“All the data and documents say nothing except that this particular right is theirs. Please let us not talk about this subject again,” he added. “There is a parliament that you elected which will debate the accord. It will either ratify or reject it.”

Al Sisi went on to complain over what he termed as the Egyptians’ chronic distrust of their leaders, saying it was pushing the country to “national suicide.”

“You don’t believe that there is a single patriotic man in the foreign ministry, the army or the intelligence agency? They are all bad people who are ready to sell off their country?” he said in a rhetorical question.

Cairo’s decision to transfer cus-tody of the islands to Saudi Arabia was announced when the Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Sal-man bin Abdulaziz Al Saud of Saudi Arabia visited Egypt earlier this week.

During his stay, King Salman pledged billions of dollars in aid and invest-ment to Egypt.

About two dozen activists staged a noisy protest over the islands’ case outside the journalists’ union in downtown Cairo, carrying banners that asserted Egyptian ownership of the islands. Others took to social media networks to dismiss the pres-ident’s comments as unconvincing.

Some of the criticism in recent days has focused on Al Sisi, who acknowledged yesterday that nego-tiations with the Saudis over the fate of the islands were conducted in secrecy to avoid unwanted media attention.

Critics are calling for a referen-dum on the transfer, arguing that a legislature packed with Al Sisi’s supporters — who gave King Sal-man a tumultuous welcome when he addressed the chamber on Sun-day, complete with standing ovations, chants of adulation and poems of praise — can hardly be expected to give the agreement serious consid-eration, let alone reject it.

City Lifestyle announced the addition of German brand BeYu to its make-up portfolio. The event was held at City Lifestyle shop at Centerpoint Al Asmakh Mall yesterday. Pic: Baher / The Peninsula

City Lifestyle launches BeYu

Continued from page 1

The areas of educational services in addition to the areas provided in Article (1) of the law include, tutoring for government and private curricula, educational training for development of individual and society, mind sport, and practical training on mathe-matical calculations, visual arts for training in painting, sculpture, pho-tography and decoration works etc,

education and training for people with learning difficulties on school curricula and the required skills.

The Cabinet took the necessary measures to issue a draft law on marine vessels after it was briefed on the recommendation of the Advi-sory Council on the law. The draft law defines marine vessels as all floating vessels working in maritime naviga-tion or sports, or be prepared for that, and of less than two hundred tons of

cargo. Under the terms of the draft law, the marine vessel are not allowed to sail unless it is registered.

The Cabinet also approved a draft law on the Official Gazette that will be referred to the Advisory Council for its recommendations. The draft law is to replace Law No. (1) for 1961 to establish an Official Gazette for the government of Qatar, in the frame-work of updating legislation.

Under the provisions of the draft

law, the Ministry of Justice will estab-lish the Official Gazette and publish it. Laws, decrees, other legislative instruments, and any articles will be published in the gazette for informa-tion of the general public.

An official online site will be established for the gazette and an electronic copy of it will be published on the same date of its issuance, in accordance with rules to be issued by a decision of the Minister.

Cabinet to issue draft law on marine vessels

MIDDLE EAST08 THURSDAY 14 APRIL 2016

Syria peace talks resume as violence surges

Speaker of Libya’s eastern

parliament slams UN envoyAP

TRIPOLI, LIBYA: The head of Libya’s internationally-recognised parliament based in the country’s far east has crit-icised the UN envoy to the North African country, saying the diplomat is acting like a “ruler.” Parliament Speaker Agila Saleh also accused the international community of trying to impose a unity government that goes against a UN-brokered agree-ment reached by Libya’s rival parties last December.

The remarks reflect the rocky path that Libya faces towards unity. The coun-try slid into chaos after the 2011 uprising that toppled and killed dictator Muammar Gaddafi, with an array of militias, includ-ing extremist groups, carving out fiefdoms and backing rival authorities.

Since 2014, it has been split into two main camps — an outdated parliament and a government backed by a set of Islamist militias and seated in Tripoli, and Saleh’s parliament and its government based in eastern Libya.

Western nations now hope the

UN-backed government of Fayez Serraj can unite the country in order to combat an increasingly powerful Islamic State affiliate.

Serraj arrived in Tripoli by the sea on March 30 and has so far been able to rally support of the capital’s militias and many of the municipal councils in west-ern Libya. The Central Bank and state-run National Oil Corporation have also backed Serraj’s unity government. But he is still resisted by the Libyan officials in the east, including Saleh, who was among Libyan officials facing EU sanctions for blocking UN-backed government.

UN envoy Martin Kobler is “acting as a ruler and a judge, setting timeline, issuing decisions” and paving the way for the unity government to seize power in the capital of Tripoli before parliament can vote on it, Saleh told Libya 218 television on Tuesday.

“The intervention is clear,” said Saleh, adding that “the international commu-nity intends to interfere in Libya to serve its own private interests.”

In eastern Libya, the parliament headed by Saleh is expected to vote on the unity government on April 18, in accord-ance with the UN-brokered deal.

Syria regime holds elections in govt-controlled areasAFP

DAMASCUS: President Bashar Al Assad’s regime held parliamentary polls in areas of Syria under its control yesterday, with some voting enthusiastically but others dismissing the elections as a sham.

Assad pressed ahead with the vote despite the start yesterday of another round of UN-brokered peace talks in Geneva aimed at ending the devastating five-year con-flict, with a political transition and the Syrian leader’s future key sticking points.

Voters could cast ballots at some 7,200 polling sta-tions opened in government-held areas — around a third of the country’s territory where about 60 percent of the population lives. Voting was extended by five hours by the electoral commission until midnight (2100 GMT), state television said, citing a “high turnout”.

Assad’s Baath party, which has controlled the coun-try for more than half a century, is expected to extend its dominance of parliament, although several parties are participating in the polls.

“I voted because this election will decide the country’s future. I hope that the winners will be true to the nation even before being true to the voters,” Yamin Al Homsi, a 37-year old who voted in Damascus, said.

Samer Issa, a taxi driver, said he had “fulfilled his national duty” by casting his vote. “Now, it’s up to the winners to fulfil their promises,” the 58-year-old added.

The presidency published photos of a smiling Assad and his wife Asma casting their ballots in Damascus. “We have been at war for five years but terrorism has failed to reach its main goal, which is to destroy Syria’s social structure and identity as safeguarded in the constitution,” Assad said.

In the ancient city of Palmyra, where Russian-backed Syrian forces drove out the Islamic State jihadist group less than three weeks ago, four polling stations opened.

AFP

GENEVA: Talks to end Syria’s brutal five-year conflict resumed in Geneva yesterday, but were clouded by a surge of violence threatening a fragile truce on the ground.

The UN-brokered talks in Geneva are aimed at forming a transitional government and a new constitution followed by general elections to end a conflict that has killed more than 270,000 people and displaced half of the country’s population.

But Assad’s fate remains a major stumbling block.

UN Syria envoy Staffan de Mistura met with Assad’s key allies Tehran and Moscow ahead of a meeting with the main opposition High Negotiations Committee (HNC) yesterday afternoon and regime representatives later in the week, probably Friday.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov stressed the importance of this round of talks, which is sched-uled to last about 10 days. “The Syrian parties should discuss the new consti-tution, and how they see the structure that will ensure a peaceful transition towards a new system,” he told report-ers in Moscow.

A Western diplomat also said “there is more riding on this round” than previous rounds, since de Mis-tura is looking to tackle the thorny issue of “what does transition away from Assad actually look like”.

Before the meeting with de Mis-tura, HNC advisor Yahya Al Aridi said the opposition would “insist that there’s one topic on its agenda: the political transition.”

The main question will be whether the regime delegation will agree to broach the issue of Assad’s future, which it until now has insisted is off limits.

De Mistura is “walking in a bit of a minefield,” Al Aridi acknowledged.

Complicating matters further, a surge in violence in recent days has threatened a landmark ceasefire agreed in February. This has piled more pressure on the talks, which follow fruitless attempts in previ-ous years to negotiate an end to the

bloodshed. “Right now, there are signs that this (the ceasefire) is slipping and it is a much more delicate envi-ronment for de Mistura to convene political talks,” US Ambassador to the UN Samantha Power told reporters in

New York after a briefing by the envoy on Tuesday.

Power said Moscow had to put pressure on Damascus to “get the regime back with the programme”, adding she was “very alarmed” by

Syria’s plans to launch a Russian-backed counter-offensive in Aleppo, the epicentre of the renewed fighting.

Moscow began an air campaign in support of the regime last Septem-ber, though last month it ordered the

bulk of its forces to withdraw. Yester-day’s parliamentary elections in Syria, which caused the regime delegation to delay its arrival in Geneva, are also adding to the tension surrounding the negotiations.

The partial truce brokered by Moscow and Washington, which took effect on February 27, had raised hopes for a resolution to the conflict, by bringing about a significant drop in civilian deaths and allowing increased aid deliveries. But humanitarian access has recently slowed again to a crawl, and escalating fighting in northern Aleppo province, parts of Hama province and Damascus has sparked alarm.

Pro-government forces were on Tuesday pressing an advance against the town of Al-Eis, held by Al Qae-da’s local affiliate, Al Nusra Front, and allied rebels, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

Jihadists like those from Al Nusra and the Islamic State group are excluded from the ceasefire. But in some areas, Al Nusra is allied with rebel forces meant to be covered by the truce. Washington voiced concern Monday that an assault on Al Nusra in Aleppo could spread to more moder-ate factions, and cause the truce to collapse and derail the peace efforts.

Asaad Al Zoubi (left), head of the Syrian opposition delegation of High Negotiations Committee (HNC) and Mohamed Alloush of the Jaish Al Islam and member of the HNC delegation, speak to the media after a new round of negotiations at the European headquarters of the UN in Geneva, Switzerland, yesterday. RIGHT: UN mediator Staffan de Mistura at a news conference in Geneva.

Russia stresses transition as 10-day negotiations get under way in Geneva.

Syrian army soldiers casting their votes for the parliamentary elections at a military facility in Damascus yesterday.

AFP

BAGHDAD: An emer-gency session of Iraq’s parliament descended into chaos yesterday, pre-venting a vote on a new cabinet amid a row over political blocs controlling key government posts.

Lawmakers argued and hurled water bot-tles at each other in the parliament hall, forc-ing a recess, MPs said. The political row comes at a critical time for Iraq, which is battling to regain more terri-tory from the Islamic State jihadist group, and Washington has expressed concern that the cabinet dispute could distract from that fight.

Iraq is also strug-gling with a major financial crisis caused by low oil prices com-bined with inefficiency and corruption, and US Secretary of Defence Ashton Carter plans to discuss Gulf states pro-viding economic aid to Iraq during an upcom-ing trip to the region.

Dozens of lawmak-ers held an overnight sit-in at parliament to pro-test efforts by influential political blocs to main-tain control of ministries, prompting speaker Salim al-Juburi to convene Wednesday’s session. Prime Minister Haider Al Abadi, who wants the cabinet to include technocrats instead of party-affiliated ministers, presented a list of nomi-nees at the end of March.

But the blocs put forward their own can-didates and most of Abadi’s were replaced on a second list dis-tributed to lawmakers on Tuesday. Some MPs demanded the oppor-tunity to vote on Abadi’s original list — from which at least two can-didates had already withdrawn — but the session was adjourned Tuesday without a vote on either the old or the new lists. Angry scenes con-tinued yesterday when MPs threw water bottles and shouted at each other, two lawmakers said.

“I wasn’t afraid to come vote today,” one newly returned resident said. Last month, the domestic oppo-sition tolerated by the regime called for a widespread boycott, accusing the government of using the vote to gain leverage in the peace talks.

The High Negotiations Committee, the main oppo-sition body involved in the negotiations, has branded the election “illegitimate”.

In Syria’s divided second city Aleppo, polling stations only opened in western government-held districts. “These elections are a farce and I don’t believe in them,” said Mohammad Zobaidiyyeh, who works as a mechanic in the eastern rebel-controlled neighbourhoods.

The vote is the second parliamentary ballot since the beginning of the war in 2011. More than 270,000 peo-ple have died since, and millions more have been forced to flee their homes.

Chaos inside

Iraq House

prevents

cabinet vote

ASIA / PHILIPPINES 09THURSDAY 14 APRIL 2016

AFP

MANILA: US forces will gain access to more military bases in the Phil-ippines than the five already announced, US Defence Secretary Ashton Carter said yesterday as he began a visit to the longstanding Asian ally.

Manila announced this year it would allow US forces to use five of its installations, including an air base close to the South China Sea.

The agreement that went in force in January aims to strengthen the Philippines’ defensive capabilities amid a tense maritime dispute with China, while helping the Pentagon pivot more of its forces toward Asia.

“They will be more, these are just the five initial sites for rotational presence” of US troops, Carter told reporters on his flight to the Philip-pine capital from India.

“The agreement provides for more sites in the future,” he said.

Short-term rotations of US forces and equipment through these five facilities is “our favourite way of having a presence, for US forces to operate in and out of the Philippines, in support of our allies, of our broader networks of friends and allies in the

region.” Carter is in Manila to attend Friday’s ceremony marking the end of an annual large-scale joint mili-tary exercise between the two allies.

He is scheduled to call on Pres-ident Benigno Aquino on Thursday.

Carter said he did not know at this time how many more Philippine military bases would be opened to US use.

“This is an evolving thing. We agreed to do these five with an understanding that they could be more and would be more, as we see what else and where else is signif-icant,” he added. The five already approved by Manila include the

Antonio Bautista air base on the western Philippine island of Pala-wan. The base is just 300km east of Mischief Reef, an outcrop occupied by China in the 1990s despite angry protests by the Philippines.

China claims virtually all the strategic and resources-rich South China Sea despite conflicting partial claims by Brunei, Malaysia, Vietnam, Taiwan and the Philippines.

Beijing has in recent months been asserting its claim by occupying more reefs and outcrops in these waters, and building artificial islands includ-ing airstrips on some of them.

The Philippines has warned the Chinese activity could be a prelude to Beijing declaring an air defence zone in the area. Washington does not take sides in the territorial disputes, but has warned against attempts to disrupt freedom of navigation in international waters.

Under the accord, US forces will also gain access to Basa air base, about 330km from Scarborough Shoal which was occupied by Chinese vessels after a tense confrontation with Philippine ships in 2012. The other bases to be used by the US mil-itary are a major army training camp with its own airstrip in the north, and two air bases in the central and southern islands of the archipelago.

US to get access to more Philippine basesThis is an evolving thing. We agreed to do these five bases with an understanding that they could be more and would be more, as we see what else and where else is significant: Carter

US Secretary of Defence Ashton Carter walks down from the plane upon his arrival at the tarmac of Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA) in Manila, yesterday.

Reuters

MANILA: Defence officials from the Philippines and Vietnam will meet this week to explore possible joint exercises and navy patrols, mili-tary sources said, shoring up a new alliance between states locked in maritime rows with China.

Ties have strengthened between the two Southeast Asian countries as China’s assertiveness intensifies with a rapid buildup of man-made islands in the Spratly archipelago, to which Vietnam and the Philippines lay claim.

Both states are also on the receiv-ing end of a renewed charm offensive

by the United States, which is holding joint military exercises in the Philip-pines to be attended this week by US Defense Secretary Ash Carter.

Vietnam and the Philippines would discuss patrols and exercises, but a deal this week was unlikely, a senior military official told Reuters.

“These are initial discussions,” he said. “These may take time but we would like to move to the next level.”

The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorised to speak to the media. The information was confirmed by another defence ministry source in Manila.

Naval patrols between the Phil-ippines and United States were

proposed by Manila in January. They could happen within a year, a foreign ministry official said. “The two sides are still talking about this,” the offi-cial said.

The exploratory talks between Vietnam and the Philippines come as ships from the United States and Japan, which has its own maritime wrangles with China, have visiting ships currently docked at Subic Bay in the Philippines, which hosted Wash-ington’s main naval base during the Vietnam War.

The regional dynamic has shifted substantially since then, with the United States now engaging Viet-nam’s military having eased a lethal arms embargo in 2014. Japan is also

working closely in defence issues with Manila and Hanoi, and two of its guided-missile destroyers are currently on a rare visit to Vietnam’s strategic base at Cam Ranh Bay.

Vietnam and the Philippines agreed on a strategic partnership in November to boost security relations as China expands its presence in the strategic waterway and deploys mil-itary equipment in the Spratly and Paracel islands.

Their closer ties mark a bold step in a region where China’s economic influence has made some countries reluctant to take a joint stand against its maritime manoeuvring.

Joint exercises would be one of the biggest steps taken by the two

countries’ militaries since signing a defence agreement six years ago.

The meeting between Vietnam’s vice defence minister, Nguyen Chi Vinh, and Honorio Azcueta, the Phil-ippine undersecretary of defense, is scheduled for Thursday and comes as a court in The Hague nears a deci-sion in an arbitration case lodged by Manila.

The ruling in the case, which seeks to clarify parts of a United Nations maritime law, could dent Chi-na’s claim to 90 percent of the South China Sea, parts of which Taiwan, Malaysia and Brunei also claim.

The South China Sea will figure in the talks between the two coun-tries, as will bilateral exchanges,

information-sharing, military logistics and defence technology, the sources said.

Vinh would tour Philippine bases, including a major naval facility. Viet-nam’s state media has not reported the visit.

Two Vietnamese frigates made port calls to Manila in 2014 and a Phil-ippine warship may do the same in Vietnam this June. Troops from both sides have played sports together twice since 2014 on disputed islands they occupy.

On Monday, Philippine Foreign Minister Jose Rene Almendras was the first foreign dignitary to meet Viet-nam’s new prime minister, Nguyen Xuan Phuc.

Hanoi and Manila to explore joint patrols in South China Sea

Filipino children swim along fishing boats in Manila bay, Philippines, yesterday. A heat wave in the Philippines has raised temperatures alarmingly, with the heat index in the northern Cabanatuan area recording 52.3 degrees Celsius.

Cooling off in scorching heat

AP

MANILA: Suspected Muslim militants have beheaded two kid-napped sawmill workers while four other captives have been freed in a brutal act in the southern Phil-ippines that appears to have been influenced by the Islamic State group’s style of killings, military and police officials said yesterday.

Army Col. Roseller Murillo said police retrieved the bodies of the two workers, who were made to wear orange gowns, in a village in Butig town in Lanao del Sur prov-ince on Tuesday.

The six workers were kid-napped by gunmen on April 5 in Butig. Four were released over the weekend after their employer negotiated with their captors, police said.

The kidnappings and behead-ings have been blamed on the largely unknown Maute group of militants, who authorities say have ties with Islamic militants from Indonesia and have used black clothing with the symbol of the Islamic State group in Syria and Iraq.

Reuters

K ATHMANDU: Sushila Karki became the first female acting Chief Justice of Nepal’s Supreme Court yes-terday, ending the male domination of top posts in the judiciary.

The Himalayan nation, though still a deeply patriarchal society, is becoming increasingly inclusive, following the end of 10 years of civil war in 2006 and the abolition of the 239-year-old feudal monarchy two years later. In September last year, a specially elected Constituent

Assembly approved the first post-monarchical constitution, which gave women the right to “proportional inclusion” in all government organs. It also guaranteed equal property rights to daughters and required that the president and vice-president be from different genders and communities. The Constitutional Council headed by Prime Minister KP Oli recom-mended the appointment of Karki, 63, to replace Kalyan Shrestha, who retired on Tuesday.

Her nomination is expected to be confirmed by a parliamentary com-mittee, though this has not yet been formed because of bickering among

political parties. An Oli aide, Pramod Dahal, said Karki would work as acting Chief Justice until the parlia-mentary hearing.

The president, who holds a cere-monial position, and the parliament speaker are also women, further signs of change in a society with a tradition of male domination. The appointment of Karki, who was the most senior judge in the SC, has been hailed by activists as a milestone in women’s empowerment in Nepal, putting it ahead of its giant neighbour India, which has not had a woman as head of its SC Courin 65 years as a democracy.

Reuters

CHINA: Two days before they sought asylum in South Korea, the North Korean waitresses in the Chinese coastal city of Ningbo shopped for backpacks at a nearby store and paid relatively expensive full prices.

“I asked them ‘Are you going on a trip?’, and they said yes,” said one of the workers at the shop, who declined to give his name. “They seemed happy.”

Another shop worker, surnamed Gong, confirmed the story.

Four waitresses from the Ryu-gyong Korean Restaurant visited the nearby store on April 5 and bought three backpacks, each for the listed 199 yuan (about $31), even though they were often known to bargain, the workers said.

Two days later, 12 of the restau-rant’s waitresses and one manager arrived in Seoul, the South Korean capital, in the biggest mass defec-tion case involving North Koreans in several years.

How they planned and executed their trip remains a mystery, but more details have quickly emerged of this defection than most others.

South Korea has said it has admitted 13 defectors, North Korean restaurant workers who arrived on April 7, on humanitarian grounds. The North has called it a “hide-ous” abduction of its workers by the South. The South Korean gov-ernment’s public acknowledgement of defections is unusual. It also said this week that two senior officials from the North had defected, but that they came over last year. The

government denied the announce-ments were aimed at influencing voters in Wednesday’s parliamen-tary election.

China has said a group of 13 North Koreans used valid pass-ports to leave the country normally on April 6, but did not say where they went. China is North Korea’s main ally and is known for sending defec-tors back to the North.

About 29,000 people have fled North Korea and arrived in the South since the 1950-53 Korean War, including 1,276 last year, with num-bers declining since a 2009 peak.

In Ningbo, shopkeepers nearby considered the North Korean res-taurant and its pretty but secretive waitresses a curiosity.

The restaurant, now closed, sits on a newly developed pedestrian street for tourists that opened for business in late September last year.

Across the lane at a cosmetics shop, Jiang Jiang recalled the noisy, patriotic North Korean music sung by the waitresses, a routine deployed at many of the around 130 North Korean restaurants around the world. Most remit revenues back to Pyongyang.

“Not my style,” she said. Moving her computer cursor between April 5 and 6 on a calendar, she added: Some shopkeepers nearby said the restaurant appeared to have been closed for renovations several months ago, but stories varied. Busi-ness did not appear to be great.

An employee of the company that manages the vintage-looking grey brick and wood buildings that line the pedestrian street, including the Ryugyong, said the workers were very secretive.

Before defecting, North

Korean waitresses

shopped for backpacksReuters

HONG KONG: A 60-year-old British man who went missing for several weeks in late March, was confirmed to have been killed in China, the Hong Kong police said in a statement after being notified by Chinese authorities.

Hilary St John Bower, who had worked as an English language instructor at the Polytechnic Uni-versity in Hong Kong, had been dead for more than a week by the time he was reported missing on March 30, according to a police statement.

“The victim was killed on the evening of March 22 in mainland China,” the Hong Kong police said, after receiving notice from their Chinese counterparts.

The police statement included no specifics, however, on how he was killed, a possible motive, or why it had taken so long to con-firm Bower’s death.

Hong Kong media reported that Bower had a longtime girl-friend and a son in the southern Chinese city of Shenzhen, and had often travelled between the two places.

The Chinese Public Security Bureau in Shenzhen said they had no information on the case when contacted by Reuters.

The Polytechnic University also gave no immediate response to inquiries about Bower.

A U.K. Foreign and Common-wealth Office spokesperson said:

“We are providing assistance to the family of a British national reported missing in southern China and are urgently seeking further information from local authorities.”

Militants behead

two kidnapped

workers in Butig

British academic

killed in China:

HK police

Nepal gets first woman chief justice

VIEWS10 THURSDAY 14 APRIL 2016

The visit of Italy’s foreign minister Paolo Gentiloni to Libya on Tuesday, mainly to bolster the unity government in Tripoli, shows that the West has finally understood the urgency of finding a solution to the Libyan crisis. Paolo Gentiloni’s is the first visit by a

top Western official to the country since 2014 and comes amid reports that the Islamic State is gaining ground in the conflict-ridden North African state and it’s becoming a centre for people smuggling. Both pose huge dangers to the West because of Libya’s proximity to Europe. The international community now sees the unity government in Libya as vital to tackling both the raging jihadist insurgency and people smuggling.

The current chaos in Libya is the result of the failure of the West to act after the ouster of Muammar Gaddafi. US President Barack Obama has admitted that the biggest mistake of his presidency was a lack of planning for the future of Libya after Kadhafi’s ouster. He now believes Washington and its allies could have done more to prevent Libya’s descent into turmoil following the Nato-backed uprising in 2011.

Asked in a Fox News interview to name the “worst mistake” of his presidency, Obama said it was “probably failing to plan for the day after what I think was the right thing to do in intervening in Libya.” Maybe the West couldn’t have foreseen the current state of affairs, but Libya’s descent has been gradual and

happened under the nose of Europe, which could have intervened long ago.

The West now will have to invest lots of energy and time to bring stability to Libya. The IS has grown phenomenally in the country. Last year, the jihadists seized control of Gadhafi’s coastal hometown of Sirte and has been fighting to expand to other areas. The number of IS fighters doubled in the past 12-18 months and now stands at about 4,000 to 6,000, according to US estimates. Libya is also complicating Europe’s migrant crisis. There are concerns that European efforts to shut down the migrant sea crossing from Turkey to Greece will encourage more people to leave from North Africa.

Libya plunged straight into instability after the overthrow of

Gaddafi with rival militias taking control of the country. It has had two rival governments since mid-2014 when a militia alliance overran Tripoli, setting up its own authority and forcing the recognised parliament to flee to the remote east. A unity government has been stitched together and this government must succeed to bring unity and stability to the country. Fayez Al Sarraj is the prime minister-designate under a UN-backed power-sharing deal in December. “I am delighted to be in Tripoli for Italy’s emergency aid and to support al-Sarraj’s Government of National Accord,” Gentiloni said.

Supporting Libya

The West has failed in supporting Libya after the ouster of Muammar Gaddafi.

Quote of the day

The actions of the Syrian regime, which are putting the Geneva negotiations in peril, must end.

Jean-Marc AyraultFrench Foreign Minister

E S TA B L I S H E D I N 1996

CHAIRMANSHEIKH THANI BIN ABDULLAH AL THANI

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

editorinchief@pen.com.qa

ACTING MANAGING EDITORHUSSAIN AHMAD

hussain@pen.com.qa

EDITOR IAL

EDITORIAL TEL: 44557741 / 44557743 FAX: 44557746 / 44557758 P. O. BOX: 3488, DOHA, QATAR E-MAIL: editor@pen.com.qaADVERTISING TEL: 44557837 / 780 FAX: 44557870 CLASSIFIED: 44557857 E-MAIL: adv@pen.com.qaSUBSCRIPTION / HOME DELIVERY TEL: 44557809 /839 FAX: 44557819 E-MAIL: info@tawseelqatar.com

Today, President Barack Obama is to assemble his top national security offi-cials at the CIA to discuss

options to increase pressure on the Islamic State in Syria. With each additional step, he risks drawing the US further into the conflict he has spent five years trying to avoid.

The meeting of the National Security Council Principals Com-mittee brings together some of the president’s top cabinet members, most of whom have been press-ing Obama to allow them to do more to fight the Islamic State in Syria. According to some reports, Secretary of State John Kerry had pestered the president so many times to ramp up the military mis-sion that the president stipulated that only the secretary of defense could bring him military proposals.

One of those proposals on the table now is to add 250 more spe-cial operations troops in Syria, a plan that Defense Secretary Ashton Carter supports, two administra-tion officials told me. Another is to ask the president to authorize the military to directly train the Syr-ian Democratic Forces, a coalition of mostly Kurdish groups fighting against the Islamic State in Syria’s northeast.

“We’ve got to get these guys beaten and as soon as possible,” Carter said last week. “We’re look-ing for opportunities to do more.”

Inside the administration, two camps have contradictory views of how to fight the Islamic State in Syria. One group wants to dras-tically increase the training and arming of the Kurds, who some see as the most effective force against the Islamic State. This camp -- including some top Pen-tagon officials, leaders of the Joint Special Operations Command, and

Brett McGurk, the president’s spe-cial envoy to the global coalition against the Islamic State -- is skep-tical of the moderate Sunni Arab rebel groups and dismissive of Turkey’s concerns about Kurdish territorial expansion.

In the other camp are officials who want to increase support to the Sunni Arab rebel groups that are not affiliated with the Islamic State or the Al Nusrah Front. These offi-cials argue that only Sunni armed groups can drive the Islamic State from Sunni lands and then hold those areas to keep the terrorists out. This camp’s big names come from the US Embassy in Ankara, the European affairs bureau at the State Department and the CIA, which has been working with Gulf states to arm and train these groups for years.

The latter group has been bolstered in recent weeks by new cooperation with the Turkish gov-ernment to help Sunni Arab rebel groups take territory in northern Syria, both near Aleppo and along the Syria-Turkey border. The Turk-ish and American militaries have been coordinating strikes for the first time to support these rebel groups. Now Sunni Arabs control a large stretch of what’s known as the Manbij Pocket, a crucial patch of land now infested with Islamic State fighters.

The Kurds are also trying to move into that very area in an attempt to connect their eastern and western zones of control. If they succeed, Kurdish control would

extend from the Lebanese border to the Iraq-Iran border, solidify-ing a de facto Kurdish state that Turkey is determined to prevent.

At Wednesday’s meeting, top officials will attempt to reconcile American support for these groups that have contradictory aims.

On Capitol Hill, lawmakers in both parties complain that the US is becoming steadily more involved in Syria, without any clear plan for how US forces and resources will be able to destroy the Islamic State.

Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Connecti-cut, told me Tuesday that he doesn’t support any increased deployment of US special forces in Syria or any more arming or training of local forces in Syria.

“There’s not much about our prior training and equip missions that are an advertisement for its future success,” he said. “You can draw up all sorts of plans of how you can influence the battle space on the ground, but very few of them have proven true thus far.”

Murphy has long been a skeptic of increased US military involve-ment in the Middle East and argues that the US should recognise the limits of American power and there-fore resist using military solutions in complex conflicts that develop largely outside of US control. He shares that view with President Obama, who speaks often about the trap that slow escalation of US military commitment can present for policy makers.

But even those lawmakers who favor military intervention in Syria

are skeptical that the president’s consideration of more options to fight the Islamic State this week will yield positive results on the ground. Senate Armed Services Chairman John McCain, R-Arizona, told me Tuesday that Obama’s “incremen-talism” in Syria was problematic.

I asked McCain whether he supports deploying more special operations forces in Syria and increasing training and arming of the Kurds there. He said focus-ing on the tactics misses the point.

“It’s not that I support them or not, but it is mission creep with-out a strategy, so it’s not likely to succeed,” he said. “They have to tell us what they are doing, how many people there are, what their plans are, and hopefully outline a strategy which as of now they do not have.”

The administration’s publicly stated strategy is to deprive the Islamic State of territory, money, troops and support, while working with major world powers to find a political solution to the Syrian crisis that would then enable all actors to focus on the fight against the terrorists.

Syrian peace talks in Geneva do provide some breathing room for the US and its allies to pursue that gradual strategy, and to con-sider other approaches. If those talks collapse, along with the cur-rent cease-fire, that breathing room will disappear, and Obama will be expected to have a plan -- not just to ramp up the tactics that have made only modest progress thus far.

Obama weighs bigger role in Syria; endgame unclear

By Josh Rogin

Bloomberg

Irina Bokova, Director-General of Unesco, speaks during the first-ever hearings of candidates seeking to become the next secretary-general at UN headquarters in New York yesterday. Over the next three days, eight contenders are expected to take the podium before the General Assembly’s 193 nations to lay out their vision for the job and answer questions.

Kerry ‘emphasised the US would welcome a constructive Russian role in anti-ISIL efforts.

OPINION 11THURSDAY 14 APRIL 2016

How next US president should manage Russia

By Josh Cohen

Reuters

Republican presidential candidate Ted Cruz calls Russian President Vladimir Putin a “bully and a dic-

tator.” Republican senator and former presidential candidate Marco Rubio says he’s a “gangster.” Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton jokes “I don’t admire very much about Mr. Putin.” Even President Barack Obama is not immune from the name calling, describing Putin as “looking like the bored kid in the back of the classroom” and taunting him by calling Russia merely a “regional power.”

There’s one problem with all these insults: Assuming he is re-elected in 2018, Putin looks likely to remain president of a resurgent Russia until at least 2024. This requires the next US president to deper-sonalise the relationship and develop a broader policy framework for manag-ing Russian-American relations, just as George Kennan did when he wrote his famous “Long Telegram” in 1946.

What should this broader policy framework entail today? One possibility lies with the acronym “DCC.” This stands for Define, Contain and Cooperate. Here’s what it means.

Define First, Washington’s interactions vis-a-vis Russia must be defined strictly by American national interests. This means understanding that not every Russian action — however much we may disagree with it — requires an American response. For example, when Russia’s bombing campaign in Syria began, Obama’s lack of response made critics howl that by not responding, Obama demonstrated weakness. Others assert that Putin’s victories in Syria threaten American interests.

These arguments overlook a central fact, though — aside from degrading and defeating Islamic State, the United States possesses no core national security inter-ests in Syria. Yes, Putin arguably “won” in Syria — he saved Syrian President Bashar Al

Assad, forced the United States to renounce its position that “Assad must go,” established four military bases and demonstrated Rus-sia’s modernised military — but so what? Syria was the Soviet Union’s leading ally in the Middle East, and the United States lived perfectly well with this fact for dec-ades. Indeed, Russia’s intervention may yet help the United States, as Russian air-to-ground bombing allowed Assad’s forces to recapture the key city of Palmyra while also killing 400 Islamic State terrorists. The bottom line is that a Russian “win” doesn’t always mean a United States “loss,” espe-cially if that win does not have an impact on important American interests.

Contain While not every Russian “win” need be interpreted as an American “loss,” some situations do require the United States to push back against Russian threats. In par-ticular, Washington must draw a clear red line regarding any attempt by Moscow to use force against any Nato ally. Washington’s Nato allies in Eastern Europe — particu-larly in the Baltics — fear this possibility.

As Russia’s relationship with the West began to deteriorate at the beginning of the Ukraine crisis, Moscow stepped up its efforts to undermine its Baltic neighbours both by high-level intelligence penetration of these states, as well as through numerous military violations of the Baltics’ airspace. Some even worry Russia may one day use force against the Baltics to challenge — and ultimately split — the Nato alliance.

While admitting three small and inde-fensible countries into Nato was arguably inadvisable, now that they are in the club, the United States remains bound by treaty to defend them. To contain this threat, the United States is therefore right to reinforce its military presence in Eastern Europe via additional armoured brigades. While it should not seek out confrontation with Russia, the United States must also not shy away from doing so if Moscow threatens the United States or its Nato allies.

Cooperate Finally, the United States should find ways to cooperate with Russia where our interests overlap — something which occurs far more often than many realise. One critical area with numerous overlapping interests is reducing the threat of nuclear terrorism and proliferation. For example, under the Cooperative Threat Reduction (CTR) programme, the United States spent almost two decades helping Russia diminish the threat of “loose nukes.”

The crisis in Ukraine, however, pro-duced a collapse in Russian-American nuclear security cooperation. The threat remains high.

One report documented four separate incidents where Moldovan police stopped criminal networks with suspected Russian ties from smuggling nuclear materials — one of which involved a Russian gang trying to sell nuclear material to Islamic State. Likewise, insider threats and corruption within Russian nuclear facilities continues

to exist, and Russia possesses the world’s largest nuclear stockpile with more than 200 buildings and bunkers where highly enriched uranium or plutonium is stored.

Not surprisingly, in the majority of cases where nuclear smuggling has been dis-covered, the material originated in Russia. Given the risk that Islamic State could — as a recent Nato report noted — “go nuclear,” the next president must put the resump-tion of Russian-American cooperation to reduce the threat of nuclear terrorism at the top of their inbox.

Russia was also very helpful in bringing the Iran nuclear deal to fruition last year, according to Western officials, particu-larly in finding a solution to Iran’s desire for domestic nuclear power. By offering to both build nuclear plants for Iran as well as supply Tehran with all the necessary fuel, Russia creatively eliminated Iran’s rationale for needing a large domestic enrichment capability. Once the deal was signed, even Obama went out of his way to thank Putin for his role in the negotiations.

Moscow also plays a key role imple-menting the Iran deal. In December, after the deal was signed, Russia took posses-sion of 8.5 tons of Iran’s enriched uranium — including the fuel closest to nuclear bomb-grade quality — leaving Iran without enough enriched uranium to make a bomb even if it wanted to. Since Russia is a member of both the United Nations Security Coun-cil and the P5+1, the United States needs

to cooperate with Russia to ensure Iran continues to comply with the agreement.

Finally, Washington and Moscow also negotiated New START, the latest nuclear weapons reduction treaty between the two powers.

The treaty requires both sides to reduce their deployed offensive nuclear weap-ons to under 1,550 by February 5, 2018, and includes numerous mutual compli-ance measures, including on-site visits. The good news is that despite the tensions over Ukraine, the Russian military con-tinues to uphold its end of the bargain. New START remains in force until Febru-ary 5, 2021, after which a new agreement must be reached. Reaching this follow-on deal should be a top priority for the next president.

The key factor driving all aspects of US-Russian nuclear cooperation are the two sides’ shared interests. Both Washing-ton and Moscow want to lower the risk of nuclear terrorism. Neither wishes to see Iran obtain nuclear weapons. And both ben-efit from reducing their nuclear arsenals. The next administration should promote American interests by cooperating with Russia in other areas such as combatting global warming, fighting narcotics traf-ficking and stabilising Afghanistan.

While demonising Putin makes for good rhetoric, a real policy that seeks to further American interests is a better way to manage the relationship with Russia.

Assuming he is re-elected in 2018, Putin looks likely to remain president of a resurgent Russia until at least 2024. This requires the next US president to depersonalise the relationship and develop a broader policy framework for managing Russian-American relations, just as George Kennan did when he wrote his famous “Long Telegram” in 1946.

UK forces offshore havens to become more transparent

By Michael Sercan Daventry

Anatolia

The Panama Papers did not just expose the secret finan-cial affairs of thousands of rich and influential people around

the world.They also served as a reminder

that whole countries can be secre-tive too – chief of all, Britain.

According to the Tax Justice Net-work (TJN), a group of global tax analysts, the UK and its former col-onies together account for the most secretive tax regime in the world.

“We regard the UK as one of the biggest, if not the biggest, single player in the global offshore system of tax havens (or secrecy jurisdictions) today,” the TJN said in its Financial Secrecy Index, a list that ranks coun-tries according to their secrecy and the scale of their offshore financial activities.

It placed the UK in 15th place in 2015 but, in an indication of the country’s global influence, more than a quar-ter of top 25 territories on the index are former British colonies that retain important judicial and administrative connections with the UK

They include Caribbean territo-ries such as the British Virgin Islands and Cayman Islands, as well as Euro-pean havens like Jersey and Guernsey in the English Channel.

All are islands that enjoy consid-erable autonomy and have their own legislatures. All offer low or zero direct taxation on their residents’ income. None are independent countries. The TJN said that if Britain was assessed together with these overseas posses-sions, it would rocket from 15th to the

very top of its Financial Secrecy Index – higher than Switzerland, Hong Kong or Singapore.

The Panama Papers, a vast collec-tion of documents leaked from Mossack Fonseca, a law firm based in the Central American country, have cast light on the financial arrangements of friends and relatives of world leaders.

Jeremy Corbyn, the leader of the main opposition Labour Party, believes they also showed why Britain needs to reassess its relationship with its former colonies.

“All of them enjoy security and pro-tection provided by the UK, all of them are dependent territories, all have some form of self-governance,” he told BBC television on Sunday morning.

“We want openness on who owns those companies, openness on the trusts and we want a tax regime that is reasonable so that they all pay some kind of contribution. It cannot be right that we’re just allowing people to shift resources offshore in order to avoid taxation in the UK”

Corbyn argued Britain should be doing more to pressure the territories’

governments into ensuring their records on company ownership and tax are more transparent and that informa-tion is routinely shared with the police so that the islands are not simply used as a vehicle for money laundering.

The treaties that govern Britain’s former colonies allow the UK govern-ment to abolish their democratically elected legislatures and impose direct rule from London.

This happened as recently as 2009, when the UK suspended the constitu-tion of the Turks and Caicos Islands following allegations of corruption among the ruling classes. A demo-cratic government was reinstated three years later.

Corbyn said the latest revelations showed the British people, having endured several years of reductions in domestic welfare spending and other areas of government, did not toler-ate large amounts of money being moved offshore by the super-rich to avoid tax.

“I’ll tell you, people that have seen their local services cut, people that are seeing their health services in any

country under threat get very angry when they see the super-rich not pay-ing their way,” he said.

UK Prime Minister David Cam-eron, who was himself criticised for not declaring that his late father had bequeathed an offshore trust to his children, has since announced that Britain’s former colonies will now share tax information with the authorities in London.

He told the House of Commons on Monday: “There are basically three things we’ve been asking the crown dependencies to do. One is to exchange tax information; the second is to have a common reporting standard; and the third is to establish registers of bene-ficial ownership. They have now done all three.”

He added: “What we’ve tried to do with the overseas territories is say there is a perfectly legitimate business of providing financial services but they, like us, should be doing it on the basis of high standards, not low standards. I think that is an argument that they now accept and carry now and we should thank them for it.”

The Panama Papers, a vast collection of documents leaked from Mossack Fonseca, a law firm based in the Central American country, have cast light on the financial arrangements of friends and relatives of world leaders.

All thoughts and views expressed in these columns are those of the writers, not of the newspaper.All correspondence regarding Views and Opinion pages should be mailed to the Editor-in-Chief.

A file picture of US President Barack Obama with Russian President Vladimir Putin during G8 summit at Lough Erne in Enniskillen, Northern Ireland.

ASIA/AFRICA12 THURSDAY 14 APRIL 2016

Reuters

SEOUL: South Koreans voted yester-day to elect a new parliament, with the ruling conservatives expected to regain a majority despite a slug-gish economy and a four-year term considered one of the least produc-tive ever.

Early voter turnout was low com-pared to four years ago, according to the National Election Commission, a trend if it continues is likely to work to the advantage of President Park Geun-hye’s Saenuri Party.

Assembly. Before recent defec-tions, it held a majority with 157 seats in the 300-seat unicameral parliament.

Voters expressed frustration that parliament has neglected real issues such as jobs and national security in Asia’s fourth largest economy and focused more on protecting politi-cal interests.

“I hope that parliament will be more mature to mirror the maturity of the voters and that politics can be used for the welfare of children and young people,” Kim Jeong-yeon, 46, said after casting her vote in Seoul.

A strong showing by Saenuri would raise expectations that it will field the winning candidate in a December 2017 presidential elec-tion to find a successor to Park at the end of her single five-year term.

The country has a strong pres-idential system around a national leader who is limited to a single term by constitution but has control over domestic and foreign policy issues.

Park’s legislative agenda has been slowed by a parliament often deadlocked by political squabble. Park has blamed both sides in par-liament for hamstringing her push to boost growth, create jobs, and get on with structural reforms she says are needed to fix chronic problems.

Saenuri enjoys strong support among older voters and it has sought to cement that by emphasising its

tough position on North Korea fol-lowing a spike in tension triggered by a fourth nuclear test in January and a rocket launch a month later.

The party has been doing well in opinion polls with 37 percent sup-port, according to a Gallup Korea survey of 1,000 people released on April 1, compared with 21 percent for the main opposition Minjoo Party.

South Korea’s economy grew 2.6 percent last year and youth unem-ployment reached 12.5 percent in February, the highest since the gov-ernment started keeping records in 1999, compared with single-digit joblessness in other age groups.

The opposition is seen as unlikely to mount a serious chal-lenge at the ballot box especially if disillusioned voters stay away, ana-lysts have said.

Ruling party to lose: Exit polls South Korea’s conservative ruling party may have lost its parliamen-

tary majority in yesterday’s general election, exit polls by three major TV channels showed. The polls said the Saenuri Party was forecast to win between 118 and 147 seats in the 300-member National Assembly. The main opposition Minjoo Party was expected to secure between 97 and 128 and the splinter opposition People’s Party to win between 31 and 43 seats.

Ballots arrive to be counted at a gymnasium in Seoul, yesterday.

South Koreans vote for new parliament

Reuters

NIGERIA: Claims by a Kaduna state official that Nigeria’s military secretly buried 347 people after clashes with members of a minority Shia Muslim sect should be inves-tigated and anyone suspected of wrongdoing put on trial, Amnesty International said yesterday.

The official on Monday told an inquiry into the December clashes in the northern state of Kaduna that the corpses were taken from an army depot and buried in mass graves.

The army has previously said the Islamic Movement in Nigeria had tried to assassinate its chief of staff, Lieutenant General Tukur Buratai, when members of the sect blocked his convoy in the northern city of

Zaria in December. The following day the army said it had raided sev-eral buildings connected to the sect.

A Nigerian army spokesman when contacted declined to com-ment on the mass burial allegations. In January, the army chief of staff told the inquiry that his soldiers had acted appropriately in the raid.

Amnesty International Nigeria said the “revelation by the Kaduna State government that hundreds of Shias were gunned down and dumped in mass graves is an impor-tant first step to bringing all those suspected of criminal responsibil-ity for this atrocity to trial”. The Shia sect has previously said up to 1,000 of its members had been killed. The inquiry has the power to impose fines and payment of compensa-tion. Most of the tens of millions of Muslims in Nigeria are Sunni.

Children wearing traditional clothing perform during the opening ceremony of the Thingyan Water Festival in Yangon, Myanmar, yesterday. It is celebrated to mark the traditional New Year in countries such as Myanmar, Thailand, Laos and Cambodia. This year, the festival runs from April 12 to 16.

Myanmar Water Festival

AFP

BLANTYRE: Malawi and Mozam-bique sounded alarm bells yesterday over worsening food shortages caused by severe drought as concerns grow over a hunger crisis spreading across much of southern Africa.

Zimbabwe, Lesotho and Zambia are also suffering food supply prob-lems, while South Africa has said the recent drought was its worst in more

than 100 years. “I declare Malawi (in) a state of national disaster follow-ing prolonged dry spells during the 2015/16 agriculture season,” President Peter Mutharika said in a statement.

“The projected drop in maize har-vest is estimated at 12 percent from last year’s output.

“More people will be food inse-cure and will require humanitarian relief assistance for the whole of the 2016/17 consumption year.”

Neighbouring Mozambique issued a “red alert” because of drought

conditions in the country’s central and south regions affecting 1.5 mil-lion people. The government released $9.5 million of emergency aid after 90 percent of crops were destroyed in some areas and thousands of cat-tle died from lack of water.

The World Food Programme said it was currently assisting nearly three million people in Malawi, with about 23 of 28 districts badly affected.

“The current drought situation in Malawi came on the back of a bad crop last year, due to flooding which

affected parts of the country,” WFP’s southern Africa spokesman David Orr said.

“The situation is quite dire and we believe the worst is still to come. It will take a long time before the situ-ations improves. Any improvement in the next months would be negligible.”

In February, the WFP warned that Malawi was facing its worst food insecurity for a decade. The country has recently suffered flash floods in the north as well as drought. The United Nations and aid groups in

Mozambique have released a total of $15 million since the beginning of the crisis, Michel Le Pechoux of the Humanitarian Country Team (HCT) which coordinates relief efforts, told AFP.

“But the response is still very lim-ited compared to the actual needs, which amount to about $200 million,” he said, adding that central Mozam-bique was the worst-hit area.

Renewed conflict between gov-ernment troops and the armed wing of main opposition party Renamo

since January has also made delivery of aid difficult due to attacks on roads.

“Some drought-stricken districts are located in areas of military ten-sions and are almost inaccessible,” Le Pechoux said. In Zimbabwe, 2.8 mil-lion people -- more than a quarter of the rural population -- do not have enough to eat. The WFP, which is pro-viding assistance for about 730,000 Zimbabweans, has reported that cas-ual agricultural labourers have no work and many children are missing school because of hunger.

Malawi and Mozambique issue drought alerts as crisis spreads

Amnesty urges probe on

mass burial in Nigeria Reuters

DHAKA: Bangladeshi security forces have detained four sus-pected members of a banned Islamist militant group who were believed to be planning attacks on celebrations of the traditional new year, a police official said yester-day.

Bangladesh has seen a surge in Islamist violence over the past couple of years, targeting liberal activists, as well as members of minority Muslim sects and other religious groups. The four mem-bers of Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen Bangladesh were arrested in an overnight raid in Mymensingh. The suspects were believed to have been planning to target cel-ebrations of the Bengali New Year.

4 held for plotting

new year blast in

Bangladesh

AP

YANGON: A strong earthquake struck Myanmar yesterday night and was felt in parts of eastern India and Bangladesh, causing residents to rush out of their homes in panic. There were no immediate reports of seri-ous injuries or major damage.

The magnitude-6.9 quake struck at a depth of 135km, 396km north of Myanmar’s capital, Naypy-idaw, according to the US Geological Survey.

Residents in Myanmar’s main city of Yangon panicked after the quake

struck, but authorities there said there were no immediate reports of injuries or damage.

An Associated Press journalist who was in a hospital in Yangon at the time of the quake said the six-story building shook strongly twice, for at least a minute. Many people in the hospital, including patients, staff and visitors, ran out of the building and began calling their loved ones.

“I was sleeping on my bed when suddenly I felt the ground shaking. The first time it was intense, but the second time it was lighter,” said Aung Thu, 25, who has been spend-ing nights at the hospital for the last week to take care of his elder brother. “I had experienced this kind of earthquake before, so I was not that scared. But I was concerned because my brother is ill, and I need to take care of him.”

He said he was on the third floor of the Shwegonedine Special-ist Center hospital, and as soon as he felt the quake he called his wife and son to tell them to be “prepared for the worst.”

The quake was centered in the jungle and hills around 220km northwest of Mandalay, Myanmar’s second-biggest city. While the area is prone to earthquakes, it is generally sparsely populated, and most houses

are low-rise structures.Since the area is remote and

the quake happened at night, a full assessment of the situation was not expected before Thursday morning.

In Monywa, a city 136km north-west of Mandalay, Ko Hein Linn Htet, a 23-year-old hotel reception-ist, said there was no major damage in the city, though there were some cracks along the walls in some build-ings. Zaw Myint Htoo, a 38-year-old resident of Mogok, 200km north of Mandalay, confirmed there was no major damage in that city.

The tremors were felt in the eastern Indian states of Assam and West Bengal, including in the area of Assam’s Kaziranga National Park, where the Duke and Duchess of Cam-bridge are visiting during their royal tour of India. The British High Com-mission in New Delhi said Prince William and his wife, the former Kate Middleton, were safe.

A failure at a power station in eastern Assam caused outages in several parts of the state. In Assam’s capital, Gauhati, people rushed out-doors as they felt strong tremors and buildings swaying. Cellphone services were disrupted, and wall-mounted television sets crashed to the ground at a local TV station. Police said they were still assessing the situation.

Quake hits Myanmar;no major damage

People crowd onto the street during an earthquake in Agartala, capital of India’s northeastern state of Tripura, yesterday.

The magnitude-6.9 quake struck at a depth of 135km, 396km north of Myanmar’s capital, Naypyidaw. It was felt in parts of eastern India and Bangladesh.

PAKISTAN 13THURSDAY 14 APRIL 2016

Reuters

GWADAR: Pakistan’s army chief yes-terday accused longtime regional rival India of seeking to undermine his country’s $46bn project to build an economic corridor to transport goods from China’s western regions through the Pakistani deepwater port of Gwadar.

Chief of Army Staff General Raheel Sharif (pictured), speak-ing at a development conference on the impact of the China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), said the

significance of a Pakistan-China eco-nomic alliance had “raised eyebrows” in the region. “In this context, I must highlight that India, our immediate

neighbour, has openly challenged this development initiative,” Sharif told the conference in Gwadar.

“I would like to make a spe-cial reference to Indian intelligence agency RAW that is blatantly involved in destabilising Pakistan. Let me make it clear that we will not allow anyone to create impediments and turbulence in any part of Pakistan. Therefore, it is important for all to leave behind con-frontation and focus on cooperation.”

Indian officials could not be reached for comment late on Tues-day night. RAW is India’s Research and Analysis Wing, its main external intel-ligence agency.

Last month, Pakistan said it had detained a suspected Indian spy for RAW in Baluchistan, the southwest-ern Pakistani province where most of the CPEC is taking shape.

India has confirmed that the man is a former Indian navy official but denied that he is a spy.

Majority Hindu India and mostly Muslim Pakistan, once part of a vast British colonial holding, have fought three wars since they were parti-tioned upon independence in 1947, leading to a violent separation that has fed decades of mutual suspicion.

Pakistan believes India is sup-porting a separatist insurgency in

resource-rich Baluchistan. It also accuses India of fuelling strife in the city of Karachi. India denies any such meddling.

India has long accused Paki-stan of backing militants fighting Indian security forces in its part of the divided Kashmir region, of help-ing militants launch attacks elsewhere in India and backing the Taliban in Afghanistan.

Pakistan says it only offers diplo-matic support to the Muslim people of Kashmir living under what Paki-stan says is heavy-handed Indian rule. It denies backing militant attacks in India.

Indian intelligence agency RAW that is blatantly involved in destabilising Pakistan. Let me make it clear that we will not allow anyone to create impediments and turbulence in Pakistan: Army chief

India trying to destabilise country: Army chief

Internews

ISLAMABAD: After an extended weekend in Lahore, Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif headed to London for a three-day visit to undergo a pending medical check-up, the Prime Minis-ter’s Office said yesterday.

When asked, a senior PM Office official said that only close family members would be joining him on the trip but did not give any details. PM Sharif’s two sons - Hassan and Hussain - are already abroad.

However, with the PM and his family becoming embroiled in the controversy surrounding the Pan-ama Papers leak, his trip to London has created a lot of interest in polit-ical circles. In particular, PPP co-chairperson Asif Ali Zardari’s presence in London is being viewed meaningfully by the media at home.

Lending credence to the possi-bility of a meeting between the two political heavyweights - a sitting PM and a former president, no less was PPP leader Aitzaz Ahsan.

At a time when PTI Chairman Imran Khan is ready to launch another sit-in, this time in Raiwind, the leader of the opposition in the Senate had been casting doubt on the reasons for the PM’s sudden visit to London. Talking to journalists outside parliament on Wednes-day, Senator Ahsan wisecracked: “The prime minister has no medi-cal issues and is only visiting London

to present himself in the court of Asif Ali Zardari.”

He was also quick to add that whenever the prime minister came under pressure, he always looked towards the PPP leadership for help.

But in response, DrMusadik Malik, one of the many spokes-persons from the Prime Minister’s Office, said that the PM had neither expressed a desire to meet the PPP leader nor had he scheduled a meet-ing with him. The PM is only visiting London for a medical check-up, Dr Malik said. But when asked, a senior PTI leader said that there was every likelihood that the PM was going to ask the PPP to bail him out, consid-ering the pressure mounting on him to have the claims against his fam-ily investigated.

In return for coming to his res-cue, the PPP may ask for something, since DrAsim Hussain and many other senior PPP leaders in Sindh were facing serious charges.

Many of the PPP’s detractors argued that last year’s acquittal from much-talked about SGS and Cotecna was made possible due to a weak prosecution of the case by the PML-N government. A well-con-nected PML-N lawmaker admitted that there was a great deal of nerv-ousness among the party’s top leaders following the leak of the Panama Papers. The PTI chairman, is also heading to London on the coming weekend to attend a couple of fundraisers for his ShaukatKha-num Memorial Cancer Hospital.

Controversies surround

Shariff’s visit to UK

AFP

MULTAN: Pakistan yester-day hanged four more prisoners convicted of murder despite inter-national criticism over its surging use of the death penalty.

Amnesty International last week described Pakistan as the world’s third most prolific execu-tioner after China and Iran, with 326 hangings last year. Yesterday’s executions took place in the cit-ies of Multan, Jhang and Sialkot in Punjab province and in Larkana in Sindh province.

Anwarul Haq was executed in Multan for murdering his brother over a land dispute in 2000, senior prisons official Chaudhry Arshad Saeed Arain told AFP.

Ghulam Farooq was hanged in Sialkot prison for murdering two women and a man due to a fam-ily feud in 1999. Muhammad Irfan was hanged in Jhang for killing a woman while robbing her home in 2006, Arain said, adding that eight more prisoners were likely to be hanged in Punjab on Thursday.

In Larkana Waris Mir Bahr was hanged for the 1995 murder of a Pakistan International Airlines employee during an attack on an airlines van carrying cash, prison officials said. Paksitan ended a six-year moratorium on the death penalty after Taliban gunned down more than 150 people.

Four more

prisoners

executed

Members of the OPBC (Organization for protection of Bulgarian citizens) leading a group of migrants from Afghanistan near Bulgarian border with Turkey, yesterday.

Afghan migrants

Internews

PESHAWAR: The tribal elders of Kur-ram Agency of Pakistan and their Afghan cousins holding lands on both sides of the border have started negotiations to continue to force mil-itants of Daesh and its affiliates out of their territory in Afghanistan’s Paktia province.

A source privy to these develop-ments said that the elders of Turi in

Kurram Agency and Zazi (Jaji), their cousin tribe in Afghanistan, were holding talks to build confidence to take measures for averting threat of Daesh and other groups in their areas.

The last meeting between the two sides was held at no-man’s-land near Borki village in Kurram Agency on April 4. The elders of both the tribes discussed situation arising after regrouping of militant groups sus-pected to be affiliated with Daesh (IS) on the Afghan side.

“Elders from both tribes have held

four meetings and discussed threat from Daesh and other militant groups to people of Kurram Agency,” said the source.

The source said that a recent inci-dent involving kidnapping of four residents of Kurram Agency was also discussed in those meetings. Armed groups, suspected to be affil-iated with IS, were demanding Rs20 million for the release of the four kid-napped men.

Military commanders of Paki-stan and Afghanistan have also held

a border coordination meeting near Borki village, a notified Customs checkpost between the two coun-tries, on Monday.

A security official confirmed the meeting. He said that regrouping of militants in Afghan areas close to Kurram Agency was also discussed in the meeting.

Kurram valley is one of the most sensitive tribal regions due to its stra-tegic location since it shares border with three provinces of Afghanistan - Khost, Paktia and Nangarhar.

The area also has a violent history due to sectarian clashes in the recent past. It witnessed the worst clashes erupted in 2007 leaving thousands of people dead and wounded.

An official in the law and order department at Fata Secretariat said that intelligence reports suggested that threat from across the border existed to villages along the border in Kurram Agency.

The administration in the area had already been intimated to take precautionary measures, he added.

Internews

ISLAMABAD: The second phase of Injectable Polio Vaccine (IPV) cam-paign will be kicked off in 18 union councils of the high-risk district of Killa Abdullah yesterday.

Officials of the Emergency Oper-ations Centre say that the eight-day campaign aims to vaccinate more than 16,300 children in Killa-Abdul-lah and Gulistan tehsil.

Provincial Coordinator of Emer-gency Operation Centre (ECO), Balochistan, Dr Syed SaifurReh-man said that during the campaign children between the age of 4 to 23 months would be injected with polio vaccine which would boost the

immunity of the children in these areas where children are most sus-ceptible to this crippling disease.

“The children aged between 0 to 23 months are most vulnerable to polio virus and more than 85 pc cases reported last year were from this age group”, he added.

He said the vaccination will be carried out through skilled vaccinators.“Around 85 temporary vaccination outreach centres and 12 fixed sides will be established in two Tehsils of Killa Abdullah,” Provincial Coordinator Emergency Operation Centre (EOC) Dr Syed Saif-ur-Rehman said. The first phase of IPV campaign had successfully been conducted in the districts of Quetta, Pishin and selected tehsils of Killa Abdullah, he added.

Internews

ISLAMABAD: A multi-million dollar port being developed by China in Pakistan is set to be at “full operation” by the end of the year, a Chinese official said yes-terday, part of Beijing’s ambitious economic plans in the region.

Gwadar port, on Pakistan’s southwest coast, will see roughly one million tonnes of cargo going through it by 2017, said Zhang Baozhong, chairman of the Chi-nese public company in charge of the development. Current trade there is “basically nothing”, he told reporters on the sidelines of a seminar about the port’s devel-opment Wednesday.

“We hope a big jump will take place Our dream is to make Gwa-dar a regional trading centre,” he said. Gwadar forms what officials call the “heart” of the China-Paki-stan Economic Corridor, a grand $46 billion project giving Beijing greater access to the Middle East, Africa and Europe through Paki-stan. The port was built in 2007 with technical help from Beijing as well as Chinese financial assist-ance of about $248 million.

Zhang said the tonnage will initially comprise “quite a number” of construction materials for the city’s development, which Paki-stani officials envision turning into another Dubai.

Internews

ISLAMABAD: Sikh and Hindu pil-grims have started arriving at the GurdwaraPunja Sahib in Hassanab-dal to celebrate Besakhi which starts yesterday. Besakhi is a Sikh religious festival, also known as Vaishakhi, and celebrates the formation of the

Khalsa, which is the collective body of all initiated Sikhs.

The festival also marks harvest season in Punjab and the beginning of a new year according to the Hindu calendar. The festival begins with a recitation of the Guru GranthSaahib and all 1,430 pages of the book are read during the three days of the fes-tival. The celebrations end when the recitation is complete on the third day

of Besakhi, on April 14 and the Bhog or the concluding ceremony is per-formed. Three special trains bringing in 2,000 people for the 10-day pil-grimage have reached Hassanabdal amid strict security measures.

Strict security measures are deployed around the temple, with fully quipped police officials, anti-terrorist units and commandoes protecting it from all sides.

Threat of Daesh unites tribal elders along along border for talks

Second phase of injectable

polio vaccine drive begins

Gwadar Port to

be operational

by 2017: Official

Sikh pilgrims arrive for festival

Sikh pilgrims arrive from India at Wagah railway station in the Wagah border region in Pakistan, yesterday. Thousands of Sikhs from various countries visit their holy places in Pakistan to celebrate the week-long Baisakhi festival which heralds the beginning of the Sikh New Year.

India tests

nuclear capable

ballistic missile NEW DELHI: Nuclear capable ballistic mis-sile K-4 was test-fired from nuclear submarine Arihant, both of which have been indigenously developed, officials said yesterday.

According to sources, the test was conducted on March 31 from Ari-hant in the Bay of Bengal. The missile was fired from around 20 metres under water, and covered a dis-tance of 700 km before hitting the target.

A dummy was also test-fired from a pontoon on March 7, the sources said. Both the missile and the submarine have been developed by the Defence Research and Devel-opment Organisation (DRDO). Arihant, the lead ship of India’s Arihant-class of nuclear-powered ballistic missile subma-rines, has been designed based on the Russian Akula-1 class submarines.

The DRDO was tight-lipped over the test. The K-4 is part of the K-fam-ily of missiles, a series of submarine-launched bal-listic missiles (SLBM), named after former pres-ident and scientist A.P.J. Abdul Kalam. The missile was developed specifi-cally for Arihant, as the nuclear capable Agni-III could not be compacted to fit in the submarine.

Odd-even: 13%

decline in

pollution level NEW DELHI: Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal yesterday said the pollution level in the city had come down by at least 13 percent dur-ing the first phase of the odd-even vehicle scheme.

“According to Fortune magazine, the pollution was reduced in Delhi by 13 per cent. There is a range of data, some claiming 20 percent while others claim 25 per cent reduc-tion in pollution during the first phase of odd-even,” Kejriwal said, while administering a pledge to school children for making Delhi pollution-free.

Citing figures to show that sale of petrol and diesel in the national cap-ital was reduced by 40 percent during the first phase, Kejriwal said it clearly indicates that pol-lution was reduced.

Heat wave

sweeps across

Telangana HYDERABAD: A heat wave yesterday swept across Telangana and Rayala-seema region of Andhra Pradesh with most places recording a maximum temperature of above 40 degrees Celsius , while a couple of places sizzled at 44 degrees, officials said.

The met office has issued heat wave warn-ing for seven out of 10 districts of Telangana and all four districts of Rayalaseema region of neighbouring Andhra Pradesh. The meteorolog-ical centre at Hyderabad said heat wave condi-tions will prevail in the districts of Hyderabad, Nizamabad, Karimnagar, Rangareddy, Khammam, Medak and Nalgonda in Telangana

INDIA14 THURSDAY 14 APRIL 2016

IANS

WEST BENGAL: Alleging a nexus between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and West Bengal Chief Min-ister Mamata Banerjee, Congress president Sonia Gandhi yesterday said the Trinamool Congress chief was following the same anti-people policies which Modi was pursuing at the Centre.

“I would like to caution you, the person who calls herself ‘didi’ (elder sister, as Banerjee is affectionately called), and the one who orchestrates the ‘NaMo, NaMo’ (Narendra Modi) cries, the two of them are together.

“When Prime Minister Modi faces problems in parliament, the Trinamool stands up to save him. In return, Prime Minister Modi turns a blind eye to the Trinamool’s anti-people activities,” Gandhi said at an election rally in Sujapur in Malda district. Banerjee asked the people whether Modi and Banerjee had taken any action against the chit

fund companies which looted thou-sands of crores of rupees from the poor in Bengal.

“They didn’t, because the BJP and the Trinamool eat from the same plate.” She said the way ‘didi’ duped the people of Bengal who had given her a mandate in Bengal, Modi had done likewise at the Centre.

“The way didi uses money, power and muscle to silence critics, Modi adopts the same tactics to bring down the Congress governments in various states. The Bengal chief minister does not send to jail those who looted poor people’s money. Similarly, Prime Minister Modi lets those who loot banks to easily flee the country.”

Gandhi alleged that the BJP-led NDA government did not believe in democracy and pointed out that Banerjee kept mum when the Con-gress government in Uttarakhand was dismissed. Refering to the alli-ance between the Congress and the Trinamool in the 2001 assembly polls in the state, Gandhi said five years back, her party had backed Banerjee, as she had promised to protect the interests of the poor, women and marginal sections.

But once Banerjee came to power, she forgot all her promises, Gandhi regretted. She said the injus-tice which is happening in Bengal, was unprecedented.

“Bengal is having to suffer the dictatorship and arbitrariness of not one, but two governments. On one side is Mamata’s Trinamool gov-ernment, on the other side is Modi’s government.” Gandhi also attacked Banerjee over “death of newborns and babies”, plight of potato growers and “law and order failure”.

IANS

NEW DELHI: India yesterday sought the “earliest possible” repatriation of the mortal remains of an Indian held in a Pakistan prison who died on Monday.

“Our acting high commissioner met DG South Asia in the (Pakistan) ministry of foreign affairs and asked for earliest possible repatriation of mortal remains,” external affairs ministry spokesman Vikas Swarup tweeted.

He said that, according to the

Pakistan government, Kirpal Singh died on April 11 at 2.55pm following a heart attack.

“We await further details,” Swarup stated. Kirpal, 54, died at a hospital in Pakistan’s Kot Lakhpat Jail. He was alleged to have been involved in a bombing at Faisal-abad Railway Station in 1991 and sentenced to death for spying and terrorism in Pakistan. He was trans-ferred to a hospital on Monday after his health deteriorated suddenly, jail officials said.

In 2013, an Indian death row convict Sarabjit Singh was attacked by two other inmates at the Kot

Lakhpat Jail. He later succumbed to his wounds at the hospital.

On Tuesday, a sister of Kirpal pro-tested at the Attari-Wagah integrated checkpost on the India-Pakistan bor-der over his death. “My brother Kirpal has been murdered just like Sarabjit was earlier. The Pakistani jail author-ities are responsible for his death,” Jagir Kaur said during the protest.

She was accompanied by many other protestors, among them Dal-bir Kaur, the elder sister of Sarabjit.

The family demanded that Kirpal Singh’s body be handed over to them for cremation at his native village in Punjab’s Gurdaspur district.

Delhi seeks early repatriation of

prisoner’s body from Pakistan

IANS

T H I R U VA N A N T H A P U R A M : Authorities yesterday started tak-ing samples for DNA tests from unclaimed bodies which perished in the devastating fire at a temple on Kerala on April 10, officials said.

As many as 113 people have been killed, 21 remain missing, and 350 were injured in the blaze that was set off by a fireworks display at the Puttingal Devi temple at Paravur town of Kollam district.

There are 13 unidentified bod-ies -- two at the Medical College Hospital here and the others at Kollam -- and samples from them were taken by police for DNA tests to the Rajiv Gandhi Centre for Biotechnology.

M. Radhakrishna Pillai, direc-tor of the institute, said they were prepared to go to Kollam to collect the blood samples of those who have lost their relatives or whose relatives are missing.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi, after visiting the temple site and the victims on Sunday, asked Chief Min-ister Oommen Chandy to see that all efforts are made to ensure that due justice is given to the unidentified bodies. Officials told the media here that the samples for DNA tests are

taken when the autopsy is done and these are kept in sealed packets.

After the tests, the results are matched with the blood samples of the living family members, and the judiciary is informed about the results first.

Chief Minister Oommen Chandy on Wednesday attacked the Left for trying to score brownie points fol-lowing the horrific tragedy in a Kerala temple.

Chandy was reacting to the remarks by CPI-M leader Kodiyeri Balakrishnan who on Tuesday sought the resignation of Home Minister Ramesh Chennithala in the wake of the Sunday disaster.

A large stock of fireworks exploded at the Puttingal Devi tem-ple in the coastal town of Paravur in Kollam district when thousands of people were gathered.

The tragedy also injured over 350 people, many seriously.

The Marxist leader said there were shortcomings the way the home department handled the entire event

Chandy told the media that Balakrishnan appeared to have forgotten that the Sabarimala and Thekkady boat tragedies took place when the latter was a minister in 2006-11. “There were numerous shortcomings of the government then, but we did not ask for his resignation.”

AFP

SRINAGAR: A protester was killed in Indian Kashmir yesterday as angry residents clashed with police, a day after three people died when the army fired into a crowd of civilians incensed by the alleged molestation of a girl. Local police superintendent

Aijaz Ahmed said the young man died of injuries sustained when a tear gas canister hit his head during the unrest in the frontier town of Kupwara.

Authorities in the restive region had imposed a partial curfew after separatist leaders called for a gen-eral strike over Tuesday’s deaths of two civilian protesters and a woman working in a nearby field who was hit by a stray bullet. The soldiers opened

fire Tuesday when protesters stormed an army bunker and set it on fire in the northern town of Handwara.

“We imposed restrictions in the old town of Srinagar and in Handwara to prevent violence,” director general of police, K. Rajendra, told AFP.

But groups of residents took to the streets of Handwara after the woman was buried, throwing stones at police who responded with tear gas, an AFP

photographer on the scene said. The army has expressed regret over the shootings and ordered an inquiry, saying anyone found guilty would be “dealt with”.

But the incident has heightened tensions in the region, where many resent the large Indian troop pres-ence and accuse some soldiers of rights abuses. Handwara residents stormed the bunker on Tuesday after

a soldier from the post was accused of assaulting a local girl as she tried to use a nearby public toilet, police and witnesses said., Kashmir’s new Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti warned the shootings would have a “negative impact” on her government’s efforts to promote peace in the region.

Kashmir is divided between India and Pakistan but each claim the region in full.

Prince William, Duke of Cambridge and his wife Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge, take part in a jeep safari at Kaziranga National Park in the north-eastern state of Assam, yesterday.

Royal visit Modi-Mamata nexus rules country: SoniaWhen Prime Minister Modi faces problems in parliament, the Trinamool stands up to save him. In return, Modi turns a blind eye to the Trinamool’s anti-people activities,

Kerala temple fire: DNA tests

begin on unclaimed bodies

People look inside the Martyrs Well in which over 100 people jumped to save their lives during the Jallianwala Bagh Massacre at the Jallianwala Bagh Memorial on the occasion of Jallianwala Bagh Massacre anniversary in Amritsar, yesterday.

Jalianwala Bagh well

One more killed as police clash with protesters in Kashmir

IANS

CHENNAI: The DMK yesterday named 173 candidates for the May 16 assembly elections, field-ing Simla Muthu Chozhan against Tamil Nadu Chief Minister J Jay-alalithaa.

Announcing the list of can-didates, the DMK said its top leader and former chief minister M. Karunanidhi will contest from Tiruvarur, 320 km from here.

His son and party treasurer M.K. Stalin will seek re-election from Kolathur in Chennai. Simla Muthu Chozhan will take on Jay-alalithaa in the Radhakrishnan Nagar constituency here.

The DMK has allotted 61 of the total 234 seats to its allies including the Congress. Notable names missing from the candi-dates’ list include former minister K. Anbazhagan, Pongalur Palan-isamy, Subha Thangavelan and Ko Si Mani. The DMK candidates include 19 women. The DMK on Wednesday also signed an alliance agreement with the Congress for contesting the Puducherry assem-bly elections also due on May 16. The Congress will contest in 21 and the DMK in nine seats. The Puducherry assembly has 30 seats.

DMK names

173 candidates

for TN polls

A bee heads for a blossom to collect pollen in Frankfurt am Main, western Germany. Flowers are in full blossoms in several parts of the world these days.

Sweet sting

EUROPE / UK 15THURSDAY 14 APRIL 2016

Warsaw blamed members of the main opposition parties in Poland for lobbying for the vote in the European Parliament.

Reuters

STRASBOURG: The European Par-liament said yesterday that an “effective paralysis” of Poland’s top constitutional court posed a threat to democracy in the biggest eastern EU state, joining critics of the euroscep-tic government in Warsaw.

Since coming to power late last year, the Law and Justice (PiS) party has enacted a law increasing the number of judges required to make rulings on the Constitutional Tribu-nal and changing the order in which

cases are heard.Critics say the changes have made

it difficult for judges to review new legislation, let alone challenge it. The court itself has struck them down as unconstitutional.

The government has refused to recognise that ruling, effectively putting it in legal limbo.

European Parliament lawmak-ers adopted a resolution yesterday, agreeing they were “seriously con-cerned that the effective paralysis of the Constitutional Tribunal in Poland poses a danger to democracy, human rights and the rule of law”.

The non-binding resolution passed with 513 votes for, 142 against and 30 abstentions.

The vote follows the European Union’s executive launching a mech-anism to establish whether the rule of law is under a systemic threat in Poland. It is the first time the mech-anism has been used since it was set up.

Warsaw blamed members of the main opposition parties in Poland for lobbying for the vote in the European Parliament.

“Perhaps for the first time we’re dealing with a situation when because of (Polish) opposition politicians’ denunciations the European Parlia-ment has passed a legal act aimed against Poles, our nation,” the Polish government’s spokesman, Rafal Bochenek, told state news agency PAP.

The European Parliament urged Poland to follow through on the top court’s ruling and called on the EU’s executive European Commission to advance its rule of law procedure should Warsaw not do that.

The ultimate sanction, though unlikely, would be to strip Poland of its voting rights in the EU.

The Parliament further urged the EU to approve the weedkiller glyphosate for seven years and not 15 as requested by the bloc’s top reg-ulator amid fears the product could cause cancer.

Glyphosate was first used in the 1970s as the active ingredient in the Monsanto herbicide Roundup and is now one of the world’s most popular weedkillers.

The European Commission, the EU’s top regulator, is recommending

that the bloc greenlight glyphosate for another 15 years when its cur-rent licence ends in June.

But critics, led by activists at Greenpeace, point to research from the World Health Organisation that

concludes glyphosate is “probably” carcinogenic and are calling for the ingredient’s outright ban.

AFP

THE HAGUE: Military police yes-terday probed a major security alert at Amsterdam’s busy international airport, with one man in custody in a jolt to Dutch authorities, three weeks after attacks in Belgium killed 32 people.

Dozens of heavily-armed military police swarmed Schiphol airport, partially evacuating parts of the pub-lic areas and arresting one suspect.

The operation was triggered after a tip-off from a bystander about an unspecified “suspicious situation”, a military police spokesman said.

“The man remains in custody and the investigation continues,” Alfred Ellwanger told reporters yesterday, refusing to reveal any details of the suspect’s identity.

“The situation at the airport has returned to normal,” he added and the airport’s authorities confirmed no disruptions were expected.

The scare at one of Europe’s busi-est travel hubs, with flight links to 319 destinations around the world, came exactly three weeks after the March 22 attacks on the Brussels airport and metro left 32 people dead and hun-dreds wounded.

The Netherlands tightened secu-rity and stepped up border controls in the wake of the suicide bombings in its southern neighbour, which also followed the coordinated attacks in Paris in November.

But it remained unclear yester-day exactly what was behind the late-night security sweep at Schiphol, after the Dutch bomb squad found nothing suspicious in the arrested man’s luggage.

Tensions have been high since

last month’s attacks in Belgium, which like the Paris attacks in which 130 people died, were claimed by the Islamic State (IS) jihadist group.

There have been concerns that the Netherlands could be targeted in a terror attack, due to its proximity to both Belgium and France, and its role in the US-led bombing campaign against IS in Iraq and Syria.

Schiphol is Europe’s fourth-larg-est airport, and welcomes some 55 million passengers every year.

No flights or train traffic were disrupted during the operation, which saw balaclava-clad and sub-machine gun-toting officers cordoning off a square at the entrance to the airport’s shopping plaza, which leads to the arrivals and departures halls.

Hundreds of passengers, many of them on long-haul flights, waited for hours until the all-clear was given yesterday.

Earlier, another scare was

triggered at nearby Leiden station but police later said it was a false alarm.

Dutch F-16 fighter jets have broadened the country’s mission in the US-led air campaign against IS, bombing jihadist targets in Syria since February.

More than 200 Dutch nationals, including about 50 women, are also believed to have joined the ranks of IS in Iraq and Syria, according to Dutch intelligence services.

Last month, at the request of French authorities, Dutch police carried out raids on an apartment in Rotterdam, uncovering about 45 kg of ammunition. French suspect Anis Bahri was arrested at the flat suspected of trying to take part in a foiled plot in France. He is now fight-ing his extradition to Paris.

Investigators have uncovered extensive links between the Paris and Brussels attacks, with many of the same people involved.

Spain detains

arms supplier

of Paris attacks

MADRID: Spanish police said yesterday they have detained a Frenchman suspected of heading a weapons trafficking ring that supplied arms to one of the jihad-ists that killed 17 people in Paris in January 2015.

Police said Antoine Denevi, a 27-year-old from a small town in northern France, was detained in the southern Malaga after Paris issued a Europe-wide arrest war-rant. He “left France weeks after the Paris attacks to escape police action, and settled in Malaga from where he continued his activities using fake papers,” the police said.

“It’s also been determined that his activities were linked with peo-ple of Serbian origin, who may have facilitated his access to arms and munitions.”

Denevi is suspected of arming Amedy Coulibaly, who shot dead a policewoman and took hostages in a Jewish supermarket, where he killed four people.

Reuters

LONDON: Britain’s electoral watch-dog yesterday picked the “Vote Leave” group, backed by London Mayor Boris Johnson, to be the offi-cial “Out” campaign ahead of a referendum on June 23 on whether Britain should remain in the Euro-pean Union.

The decision, which hands the group several advantages over rival “Out” campaigns including a higher spending limit, will pit Johnson against his party leader Prime Min-ister David Cameron, the effective head of the “In” official campaign.

The two main “Out” groups, one backed by UK Independence Party leader Nigel Farage and the other by several senior members of Cameron’s Conservatives, had been involved in a bitter contest to win the designation.

“After careful consideration, the commission decided that ‘Vote Leave

Ltd’ better demonstrated that it has the structures in place to ensure the views of other campaigners are represented in the delivery of its campaign,” the Electoral Commis-sion said in a statement explaining why it had chosen the group over rivals Grassroots Out.

Although Vote Leave said they would work with others who wanted to campaign for an “Out” vote, some of those aligned with Grassroots Out said they would contest the decision.

The main benefits of being the lead campaigner are a higher spend-ing limit of £7), free distribution of campaign materials to voters, cam-paign broadcasts and a grant of up to £600,000 to be used for admin-istrative costs.

“I am unsatisfied with the Elec-toral Commission’s decision for a variety of reasons that I will be making clear in my application for judicial review,” UKIP donor Arron Banks, Banks said in a statement issued to the media.

AFP

LONDON: A local authority in Britain has told a joggers’ group to start pay-ing for the upkeep of the park they use for weekly organised runs or stay away, sparking outrage from British champion runner Paula Radcliffe.

“We have had operational issues affecting other park users. This has caused some friction,” a represent-ative of Stoke Gifford parish council,

a suburb of Bristol in southwest Eng-land, said yesterday.

The council voted six to four in favour of a motion giving “Parkrun”, an organisation which stages free weekly five-kilometre timed runs worldwide, until May 28 to start paying.

“What we’ve asked Parkrun to do is to contribute to the upkeep,” said the council representative, adding that the runs had expanded from around 60 people a week a few years ago to 300-400 people including

many people from outside the village.Parkrun’s chief operating officer

Tom Williams said the decision was unprecedented, adding: “We are extremely disappointed.”

“Parkrun has had unprecedented success in engaging the least active and encouraging them to exercise regularly,” he said in a statement.

Radcliffe, who is the current holder of the women’s marathon world record, said on Twitter: “Am totally against this short sighted decision”.

Reuters

LONDON: Mental illnesses are the world’s leading cause of disability affecting millions and, even during a humanitarian crises, treating them is not an optional luxury, experts said before a World Bank/World Health Organisation meeting on the issue in Washington this week.

The number of people affected by humanitarian crises has nearly doubled in the past decade, and the number of people forced to flee their homes - more than 60 million - is at its highest since World War II.

The WHO estimates the preva-lence of common mental disorders, including anxiety and depression, can double during a humanitarian crises to up to 20 percent of the population from 10 percent in normal times.

“The number of people affected by humanitarian crises is increasing globally, which also increases mental

health needs,” Inka Weissbecker, glo-bal mental health and psychosocial adviser at aid agency International Medical Corps, said

She is on one of the panels organ-ised by the World Bank and WHO around the high-level meeting.

Some countries affected by war - like Sierra Leone and South Sudan - have only one or two psychiatrists to treat the entire population, she said.

“The problem with mental health is it’s often invisible because it’s not measured, so people such as donors or local governments may not think about it, or think it’s important,” she added. Stigma and lack of knowledge are big barriers in all countries, with many people unaware that mental ill-nesses are treatable, Weissbecker said.

Mark van Ommeren, public men-tal health adviser at WHO, said: “We have a lot of data showing that men-tal health is a much bigger problem, a much bigger part of life, than peo-ple previously realised - it’s one of the elephants in the room.”

Wars and natural disasters can open a window for a fresh focus on mental health care, which in turn can be vital to improving a country’s economy and overall development, he said.

A WHO-led study published on Tuesday said that every $1 invested in scaling up treatment for depres-sion and anxiety led to a return of $4 in better health and ability to work.

The study estimates for the first time both the health and the economic benefits of investing in treatment, and is based on studies of 36 low, middle and high-income countries.

Many countries, including Afghanistan and Sri Lanka, have transformed their mental health care as a result of an emergency.

Before the 2004 South Asian tsu-nami hit Sri Lanka, most of the island nation’s mental health care was offered by hospitals in big cities, and the majority of people needing treat-ment did not receive it, according to a

paper Ommeren co-authored.After the tsunami, the govern-

ment realised more widespread care was needed to help the acute distress of survivors. It introduced commu-nity-based and comprehensive care, and set up a one-year diploma course to train more carers in mental health.

Afghanistan too has prioritised mental health since the fall of the Tal-iban government in 2001, and it aims to roll out access to some form of care in all primary health clinics across the country.

Other countries that have improved their mental health care include Burundi, Indonesia’s Aceh province, Iraq, Jordan, Kosovo, East Timor, Lebanon and now Syria.

“The interest in mental health in and after an emergency is enormous.

“It’s not surprising to see that the countries who have made the greatest progress in mental health system development are those that have been through emergencies,” van Ommeren said.

Dutch probe airport security scare in wake of Brussels bombing

Dutch policemen stand guard by a cordoned off area outside Amsterdam’s Schiphol Airport after it was partially evacuated.

‘Vote Leave’ group named ‘Out’ campaign

Park joggers told to pay or leave

Mental health care in emergencies ‘not luxury’: Experts

Poland crisis threatens democracy: EU Parliament

Portugal’s President Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa addresses the European Parliament in Strasbourg, France.

A view from the James Bond 007 retrospective exhibition at the Grande Halle de la Villette Centre in Paris, France, yesterday. The exhibition will begin on April 16 and last till September 4.

Expo on James Bond

EUROPE16 THURSDAY 14 APRIL 2016

Macedonian police fired scores of tear gas canisters, stun grenades and rubber bullets at the protesters, who had earlier tried to scale the border fence using blankets to get over coils of razor wire.

AP

IDOMENI, GREECE: More than 100 migrants engaged in running battles with Macedonian police yesterday on the other side of a fence on Greece’s border with the country, in clashes that sent clouds of tear gas wafting over a crowded tent city of stranded refugees and other migrants.

The violence stopped a planned tour of the border fence in Mace-donia by the visiting presidents of Croatia and Slovenia.

No injuries were reported from the clashes at the closed Idomeni crossing, while Greek riot police monitoring the stone-throwing migrants on their side of the fence made no arrests, did little to inter-vene and retreated during the tear-gas barrage.

Macedonian police fired scores of tear gas canisters, stun grenades and rubber bullets at the protesters, who had earlier tried to scale the border fence using blankets issued by humanitarian groups to get over coils of razor wire. Many of the can-isters were neutralised by blankets and earth thrown over them by the protesters.

About 11,000 people have been living in the informal camp for weeks, since Macedonia closed its border to transient refugees and other migrants hoping to move north towards Europe’s prosperous heart-land. Before the shutdown, which was triggered by a similar move in Austria, further north on the migra-tion corridor, about 850,000 people who had arrived in Greece on smug-glers’ boats from Turkey had entered Macedonia from Idomeni.

The camp residents — mostly Syrian, Iraqi and Afghan refugees — have ignored repeated calls from Greek authorities to relocate to organised camps, and attempted

several mass incursions into Macedo-nia in recent weeks, trying to bypass the fence or break through it.

Alaeddin Mohamad, a 26-year-old law student from Aleppo, Syria, who has lived in the camp for a monthsaid that the protest started with a peace-ful sit-down in front of the fence, and Macedonian police responded with tear gas.

“We don’t want to clash. We want

the borders to open and get on with our lives,” Mohamad said. “I want to continue my studies in Europe. I will stay here until the border opens. Oth-erwise, I will die here.”

On Sunday, severe clashes between stone-throwing migrants and Mace-donian police using tear gas, stun grenades, rubber bullets and a water cannon left scores injured. The vio-lence increased friction between the

two Balkan neighbours — at odds for a quarter-century over Macedonia’s offi-cial name — with Macedonia accusing Greece of doing nothing to stop the rioters and Athens denouncing Sko-pje’s heavy-handed response.

On the Macedonian side of the border, the presidents of Macedonia, Croatia and Slovenia met in the town of Gevgelija, a few kilometres from Idomeni.

Croatia demands

clear EU policy

on migrants

AFP

GEVGELIJA, MACEDONIA: Croatia’s President Kolinda Grabar-Kitarovic yesterday demanded the EU imple-ment a clear policy on migrants as she and two other Balkan heads of state visited a flashpoint area on the Greece-Macedonia border.

“EU should be clear in its policy towards migrants and take care of those who have the right to asylum, who are fleeing war,” Grabar-Kitar-ovic said after visiting a reception centre in Gevgelija on Macedonia’s southeastern border with Greece.

She was accompanied by her Mac-edonian and Slovenian counterparts, Gjorge Ivanov and Borut Pahor.

“The migrant wave will not stop by itself, not until those messages are clear,” she said.

Over the past three days, hun-dreds of people have tried to force their way across, with Macedonian police using tear gas and other riot control means to stop them in scenes of violence which have drawn crit-icism in Europe and sparked a row with Greece.

The Macedonian president said the unrest was the result of “major pressure by the migrants to obtain (the) re-opening” of the Balkans route, and underlined the country’s right to protect its border.

As they visited, further clashes erupted just a few hundred metres (yards) away, with Macedonian police firing tear gas and stun grenades at around a hundred migrants protesting on the Greek side of the fence.

AFP

SKOPJE: Macedonia was mired in fresh political turmoil yesterday after the president blocked judicial proceedings against top politicians embroiled in a wire-tapping scan-dal, sending opposition protesters back onto the streets in a crisis that is threatening country’s EU aspirations.

The United States and European Union both voiced “serious con-cerns” about the move by President Gjorge Ivanov, which drew hundreds of demonstrators onto the streets of Skopje. The country is also on the frontline of the migrant crisis, with its actions blocking people from crossing into Macedonia leading to a row with neighbouring Greece.

In a televised address to the nation, Ivanov said he was bringing the legal proceedings to a halt “in order to put an end to this political crisis, which will end with demo-cratic elections”.

Last year the oppposition Social Democratic Union of Macedonia (SDSM) accused then prime minis-ter Nikola Gruevski of wiretapping around 20,000 people including pol-iticians and journalists, and said the recordings revealed high-level cor-ruption. The government denied the accusations and in return filed charges against SDSM leader Zoran Zaev, accusing him of “spying” and attempts to “destabilise” the coun-try, which is hoping to join the EU.

Gruevski was among those being targeted in the probes, along with Zaev, former interior min-ister Gordana Jankulovska and

ex-intelligence chief Sasho Mijalkov.A political ally of the president,

Gruevski stepped down as premier in January to open the way for par-liamentary elections in June—but the opposition wants to boycott them.

Although he may himself benefit from the amnesty, Zaev denounced what he called a “coup d’etat” by “the man put in place by Nikola Gruevski”.

The pardon immediately raised tensions on the streets as hundreds of protesters staged demonstrations, some of them pelting Ivanov’s party HQ with eggs.

Further protests were possible with law professor Ljubomir Frcko-ski, who is close to the SDSM, saying on television that “citizen marches could be the solution”.

Macedonia has been a candidate for EU membership since 2005 but accession talks have yet to open and the prolonged crisis will do nothing to improve its chances.

The bloc’s foreign policy arm voiced alarm, saying Ivanov’s amnesty raised “serious concerns”.

“We call on all sides to avoid interventions that risk undermining years of efforts within the country and with the support of the interna-tional community to strengthen the rule of law,” it said in a statement.

EU Enlargement Commissioner Johannes Hahn said on Twitter that Ivanov’s decision was “not in line with my understanding of the rule of law”.

The US embassy said it was seeking clarification of Ivanov’s move, but warned that it “raises serious concerns about Macedo-nia’s commitment to the rule of law”.

AFP

BERLIN: The death toll from a Ger-man train crash rose to 12 yesterday, a day after a rail dispatcher was arrested, accused of having been distracted by a mobile phone game shortly before the accident.

Two commuter trains crashed head-on at high speed near the south-ern spa town of Bad Aibling early on February 9 in one of Germany’s dead-liest accidents in years, which also

left several dozen passengers injured.The latest victim was a 46-year-

old man who died of his injuries in a Munich hospital more than two months after the disaster, said Bavar-ian police.

German railway dispatcher blamed for a train crash was dis-tracted by playing a mobile phone game at the time, prosecutors charged.

Prosecutors, who had previ-ously blamed the signalling worker’s “human error”, said they had now remanded the 39-year-old driver in

custody on involuntary manslaugh-ter and other charges.

A court ordered the arrest of the 39-year-old railway signalling worker on involuntary manslaughter and other charges.

Prosecutors said the man had “turned on his mobile phone while on duty on the morning of the disaster, launched an online computer game and played it for a long period until shortly before the train collision.”

“Apparently because of this dis-traction, the accused made... false assumptions, sent the wrong signals

to the trains and pressed the wrong radio key combinations in both emer-gency calls so that the drivers could not receive them.”

This meant his error was not just a “momentary lapse” but represented a “serious breach of duty”, said the chief prosecutor in the southern town of Traunstein in a statement.

The worker allowed two trains from opposite directions, carry-ing about 150 passengers in total, to travel on a single track. They collided in a forest area about 60 kilometres southeast of Munich.

Ukraine eyes

vote on new

pro-EU govt

AFP

KIEV: Strife-torn Ukraine appeared to move a step closer yesterday to agreeing a new pro-EU government headed by parliament Speaker Volodymyr Groysman that could be voted today.

A senior member of President Petro Poroshenko’s party said that “according to my information, all the agreements have been reached and no further questions remain.”

“We will submit the prime minister’s candidacy to the pres-ident and (on Thursday) be able to vote on the approval of both a new premier and government,” Poroshenko party deputy Oleksiy Goncharenko told reporters.

The pro-EU coalition that formed after the so-called Maidan Revolution has since cracked and forced the parties led by Porosh-enko and Yatsenyuk—parliament’s two largest—to enlist a handful of other lawmakers to make sure that a new government is approved.

Groysman himself sounded a more cautious note than Gon-charenko speaking to reporters before parliamentary debates.

“The situation is very difficult,” said Groysman, 38, a lawyer by training. “But the time has come for us to assume responsibility. I think we have reached a format that may be acceptable, respon-sible and capable of leading our country out of crisis.”

AFP

PARIS: Tax authorities from the world’s richest nations yesterday probed a mass of murky offshore dealings revealed in the huge Pan-ama Papers data leak, just hours after police raided the law firm at the cen-tre of the scandal.

The leak of 11.5 million confiden-tial offshore financial documents

from Panamanian law office Mos-sack Fonseca offered international tax officials meeting in Paris an unprec-edented trove of data to delve into alleged wrongdoing, officials said.

“We are basically trying to get the bigger picture,” Australian Tax Com-missioner Chris Jordan, who proposed a joint investigation, said.

“A number of countries have got slices or pieces of the data and that’s very useful, but really, the start of the conversation is to work out who’s got

what, how we can pool that informa-tion and start to work together.”

The global network looking into tax havens is an initiative of the Paris-headquartered 38-nation advanced economies club, the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Develop-ment (OECD).

“The meeting at the OECD presents tax administrations with a first opportunity to act on the consid-erable body of information revealed by the Panama Papers release,” the

OECD said in a statement. The tax officials gathered behind

closed doors in Paris just hours after the Panamanian police’s organised crime police raided the headquarters of Mossack Fonseca, which says its confidential documents were stolen in a computer hack.

Leaders in Britain and Ukraine have faced questions over their taxes, while Russian President Vladimir Putin has sought to divert attention from his entourage by claiming it

is all a US plot against him.And wealthy citizens in Australia,

France, India, Mexico, Peru, Spain and elsewhere face probes over suspected tax avoidance after their names fig-ured in some of the documents.

Paris put Panama back on its national list of uncooperative juris-dictions, after removing it in 2012, in the wake of the leaks.

France is also urging the Euro-pean Union and all OECD member states to follow suit.

Migrants clash again with cops on border

Macedonian President Gjorge Ivanov (left) and Croatian President Kolinda Grabar-Kitarovic (centre) talk to a UNHCR staff member at the registration and transit camp for refugees near Gevgelija, former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, yesterday. Macedonian, Slovenian and Croatian presidents are on a two-day work visit to Macedonia to gather first hand information about the refugee situation at the border with Greece.

Macedonian president

blocks wire-tapping probe

German train crash claims 12th victim; one arrested

Rich nations probe Panama Papers tax revelations

Actress Patricia Arquette meets House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi, representatives Carolyn Maloney, Doris Matsui and Lois Frankel at a discussion on“When Women Succeed, America Succeeds,” at the US Capitol in Washington DC, yesterday.

Women empowerment

Bernie Sanders addressed the crowd of striking workers from Verizon Communications Inc as “brothers and sisters” and thanked them for standing up to what he characterised as corporate greed.

AMERICAS 17THURSDAY 14 APRIL 2016

Agencies

WASHINGTON: Democratic pres-idential candidate Bernie Sanders paid an impromptu visit to a Verizon workers’ picket line in Brooklyn yes-terday after being endorsed by New York City transit workers as he tried to wrest a bit of union support from rival Hillary Clinton.

Sanders addressed an enthu-siastic crowd of striking workers from Verizon Communications Inc as “brothers and sisters” and thanked them for their cour-age in standing up to what he

characterised as corporate greed.It was a scene tailor-made for

the US senator from Vermont, who has focused on income inequality in his campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination. Sanders is trying to catch up with Clinton, the front-runner, in Tuesday’s primary in New York, a state both candidates have called home.

Workers cheered as Sanders criti-cised the mammoth communications company for wanting to take away health benefits, outsource jobs and avoid federal income taxes, calling it “just another major American cor-poration trying to destroy the lives of working Americans.”

“Today you are standing up not just for justice for Verizon workers, you’re standing up for millions of Americans ... and you’re telling cor-porate America that they cannot have it all,” Sanders said.

Nearly 40,000 Verizon employ-ees walked off the job yesterday in one of the largest US strikes in recent years after contract talks hit an impasse.

While Sanders whipped up the crowd of hundreds in Brooklyn, Clinton’s campaign issued a state-ment criticising Verizon for wanting to outsource more jobs and urging the company to go back to the bar-gaining table.

“To preserve and grow America’s middle class, we need to protect good

wages and benefits, including retire-ment security,” Clinton said. “And we should be doing all we can to keep good-paying jobs with real job secu-rity in New York.”

In the earlier development, Clinton won the backing of a local unit, representing more than 27,000 area workers, of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, one of the unions involved in the Verizon strike.

Sanders has championed the rights of working-class Americans, including a proposed $15 federal minimum wage, in daily campaign speeches targeting corporate greed.

Yet Clinton has racked up sup-port from unions representing majority of organised labour, a crucial base of support for the Dem-ocratic Party.

They include influential unions such as the AFSCME, a public employees union with 1.6 million members, and the Service Employ-ees International Union, or SEIU, which has about 2 million members in a variety of professions.

In what was widely viewed as a win for Sanders, the AFL-CIO in Feb-ruary declined to endorse a candidate in the Democratic primary.

Meanwhile, a report from New York quoting a newly released doc-ument said that Donald Trump was once on good terms with Democratic front runner Hillary Clinton.

Reuters

WASHINGTON: US President Barack Obama seemed to inch a little closer to endorse former secretary of state Hillary Clinton’s presidential bid.

During remarks at a museum dedicated to highlighting the fight for women’s equality, the president, who has made clear his admiration for his one-time rival but has not offi-cially endorsed her, said he hoped one day people would be amazed that the United States had not had a female commander-in-chief.

Clinton is running against US Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont to be the Democratic Party’s 2016 presidential candidate. She lost the 2008 race to Obama, who was then a US senator and who later made her the nation’s top diplomat in his administration.

Obama, perhaps realising that people would read his remarks as a hint of support for Clinton, tem-pered them by saying he did not know when a woman would win the White House. “I don’t know how long it’ll take to get there, but I know we’re getting closer to that day because of the work of generations of active,

committed citizens,” he said.White House spokesman Josh

Earnest said Obama’s remarks indi-cated the country was ready for a woman president, but he stressed the candidates would be judged on their values and policy agenda.

Obama remains popular with the base of Democratic supporters who helped him to the White House and re-elect him in 2012. An endorsement of Clinton could help her vanquish Sanders, who is behind her in amass-ing number of delegates needed to become nominee but has remained a strong challenger with wins in a number of state nominating contests.

AFP

WASHINGTON: Governments around the world are cracking down on basic freedoms, the United States warned yesterday, in a report that did not spare key US allies.

US Secretary of State John Kerry, writing the preface to his department’s annual human rights report, said attacks on democratic values point to a “global govern-ance crisis.”

“In every part of the world, we see an accelerating trend by both state

and non-state actors to close the space for civil society, to stifle media and Internet freedom, to marginal-ise opposition voices, and in the most extreme cases, to kill people or drive them from their homes,” he said.

The report, compiled on a coun-try-by-country basis by US diplomats, has no legal implications for US pol-icy and a critical write up does not compel Washington to cut ties or mili-tary aid to rights abusers or to impose sanctions upon them.

But Kerry argued that the detailed report—the 40th his department has produced—would strengthen US determination to promote what he

called “fundamental freedoms” and to support those groups Washington sees as human rights defenders.

“Some look at these events and fear democracy is in retreat,” he said. “In fact, they are a reaction to the advance of democratic ideals, to rising demands of people from every culture and region for governments that answer to them.”

As might be expected, the report is critical of US rivals like Russia and China—where it says civil rights groups face increasing repression—and of foes like Iran and North Korea, where citizens face extrajudicial kill-ings and torture.

But it also paints a grim picture of the state of play in some allied coun-tries, including Nato member Turkey, where President Recep Tayyip Erdog-an’s government has cracked down on opposition media and arrested sev-eral leading journalists.

“The government has used anti-terror laws as well as a law against insulting the president to stifle legitimate political discourse and investigative journalism,” the report says.

The report will anger Erdogan, who visited Washington last month and denied that there had been any crackdown on free expression in his

country, even as his security detail tried to expel opposition journal-ists from the think tank hosting his speech.

Egypt, which receives $1.5bn in US military aid despite President Abdel Fattah Al Sisi authoritarian style of rule, also faced stern criticism from the US Secretary of State.

“There were instances of per-sons tortured to death and other allegations of killings in prisons and detention centers,” the report says, citing non-government-organisa-tions and UN reports of hundreds of Egyptians having gone missing since the 2011 revolution.

Rousseff to

‘fight to last

minute’ against

impeachment

AFP

BRASÍLIA: Brazil’s President Dilma Rousseff vowed yesterday she will “fight to the last minute” against efforts to impeach her, despite key allies deserting her as she clings to office.

“I will fight to the last minute of the second half,” she said, employ-ing a football metaphor, in an interview published by several media yesterday.

Lawmakers will hold a crucial vote on impeachment proceed-ings against Rousseff in Congress on Sunday.

In yesterday’s interview, she repeated her offer to forge a political compromise pact if she survives Sunday’s vote.

The 68-year-old leader is moving closer to being driven from office in a political and economic crisis rocking Latin America’s biggest country less than four months before it hosts the Olympic Games.

Pressure rose after two blocs in Rousseff’s ruling coalition announced on Tuesday they would vote to impeach her.

Those defections swelled the number of lawmakers likely to back a motion against her when the lower house of congress votes Sunday on whether an impeach-ment trial should be launched.

Polls published in the Bra-zilian media indicate opposition parties are closing in on securing the 342 votes needed to approve the impeachment motion and send it to the Senate for a further vote.

AFP

NEW YORK: Relatives whose loved ones died last year when a Germanwings pilot deliberately crashed a plane in the French Alps filed a wrongful death suit yester-day against the US flight school that trained him.

“Andreas Lubitz, the suicidal pilot, should never have been allowed to enter” the training pro-gram at Airline Training Center Arizona, Inc. (ATCA), said Brian Alex-ander, an attorney who filed the suit in federal court in Phoenix, Arizona.

It was filed on behalf of 80 peo-ple whose relatives perished in the March 15, 2015 crash of a German-wings’ Flight A320. Alexander’s firm, Kreindler and Kreindler, was joined in the suit by attorneys in Britain, Germany and the Netherlands.

The crash took 150 lives, includ-ing that of Lubitz, a troubled pilot who had struggled for years with mental health problems.

The 28-year-old locked the pilot out of the cockpit and while alone at the controls, steered the jetliner into the side of a mountain, killing all 144 passengers and six crew.

The pilot, Captain Patrick Sondenheimer, can be heard on the “black box” recording retrieved from the crash site, banging on the cock-pit door in the minutes before the crash, pleading with his young co-pilot to open it up.

Lubitz had received pilot train-ing at ATCA between November 2010 and March 2011. ATCA is owned by the German airline Lufthansa.

A spokeswoman for Lufthansa said the suit had “no chance of suc-cess,” but declined further comment.

Alexander said ATCA was “not just negligent, but also careless, and even reckless, in failing to apply its own well-advertised ‘stringent’ standards to discover the history of Lubitz’s severe mental illness that should have kept Lubitz from admis-sion to ATCA’s flight school.”

Investigators determined after the crash that Lubitz, 27, had a his-tory of depression and suicidal tendencies and the case has raised questions about medical checks faced by pilots as well as doctor-patient confidentiality.

But the plaintiffs’ lawyers said numerous red flags should have made it clear that Lubitz—with a history of serious mental illness that included suicidal tendencies—was unfit to be a pilot.

His struggle with depression and other mental illnesses before enter-ing ATCA’s programme was serious to require that he break off his pilot’s training for 10 months and receive treatment in hospital, the lawyers said in their suit.

Lubitz had filed false documen-tation with the US Federal Aviation Administration, deliberately con-cealing “his true medical history, past medical diagnoses and lengthy treatment, including hospitalisation, for multiple psychotic and mental disorders,” the lawsuit said.

Still, the German medical certif-icate Lubitz presented to ATCA bore a notation that indicated the certif-icate would be invalidated if there were a relapse or recurrence of his depression, according to the lawsuit.

Reuters

OTTAWA/WINNIPEG, MANI-TOBA: Canadian legislators told an emergency parliamentary ses-sion that a rash of suicide attempts by aboriginal teenagers in a remote, poverty-stricken community was “completely unacceptable” and vowed steps to keep it from happening again.

Over the past weekend alone, 11 members of the Attawapiskat

First Nation community in north-ern Ontario tried to kill themselves, prompting the chief to declare a state of emergency. Separately, a second group was hospitalised after suicide attempts.

Health Minister Jane Philpott said the suicide rates among aboriginal youth were at least 10 times higher than for the general population of young people.

“It is a staggering reality, it is completely unacceptable ... there is nothing more devastating than

realising someone has reached the point of no hope,” she told the debate in the House of Commons. “Tonight has to be a turning point for us as a country in order to decide together that we will do better,” she said.

Canada’s new Liberal govern-ment said last month it would spend an extra C$8.37bn ($6.54bn) over five years to help the aboriginal popula-tion deal with dire living conditions.

Declaring a state of emergency is a symbolic move and does not legally oblige Ottawa to take action, said a

government spokeswoman.The problems plaguing aborigi-

nals gained prominence in January when a gunman killed four people in La Loche, Saskatchewan. An abo-riginal teenager was charged in the shootings. Legislators complained during the debate that Ottawa had not yet delivered all the extra aid it had promised La Loche. Another Canadian aboriginal community in the western province of Manitoba reported six sui-cides in two months and 140 suicide attempts in two weeks.

Sanders joins striking workers at Verizon office

Obama hints at support for Hillary

Germanwings victims’ kin sue pilot’s school

Canada lawmakers concerned over rise in suicide cases

Govts around the world stifling basic freedoms: US

Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders greets the crowd before his campaign rally at Marist College in Poughkeepsie, New York.

Jugglers perform to collect money for the family of a colleague, who they said was killed by a stray bullet during a gunfight between police and a gang member, in San Salvador, El Salvador.

For a noble cause

AMERICAS18 THURSDAY 14 APRIL 2016

AFP

BUENOS AIRES: Argentina’s ex-leader Cristina Kirchner faced a judge yesterday over alleged fraud in a case raising the political heat after her suc-cessor was separately named in the Panama Papers scandal.

The ex-president, 63, has rejected the accusations that she was involved in suspect currency transactions by Argentina’s central bank last year in the closing months of her presidency as a plot by the new government.

“I am not afraid of them,” she wrote in a declaration filed with the court yesterday and published on her Facebook page.

“I will face up to this case and any other one that they want to fabricate against me.”

The case follows separate rev-elations that current conservative President Mauricio Macri had ties to an offshore company named in the Panama Papers leaks. He has denied any wrongdoing.

Macri took over from Kirchner

in December after he narrowly beat her side in an election. That ended 12 years of leftist rule by her and her late husband Nestor, who came to power after a financial crisis.

Macri launched steps to liber-alise the Argentine economy, Latin America’s third biggest. Kirchner’s supporters say his spending cuts and price rises are hurting poorer families.

Thousands of Kirchner’s support-ers gathered in the rain to greet her as she arrived smiling at the courthouse in central Buenos Aires. “Cristina, the people are with you,” they yelled. “If you go to jail, I’m going with you,” read one of the signs.

Judge Claudio Bonadio is inves-tigating whether there are grounds to charge Kirchner over claims that she mishandled public funds in con-nection with the sale of dollars below market value by the central bank in September. It is one of numerous cases connected to former leading officials from the Kirchners’ center-left governments.

Bonadio is an open critic of Kirch-ner, who in the past tried to have him dismissed from his post.

First step in anti-IS

battle in Iraq and

Syria complete:

Pentagon

AFP

WASHINGTON: The US-led coali-tion campaign against the Islamic State group in Iraq and Syria has successfully completed its first “phase” of operations, a US mil-itary spokesman said yesterday.

The coalition is working through three main steps as it wages its 20-month-old fight against the IS group, Baghdad-based spokesman Colonel Steve Warren said.

“Our enemy has been weak-ened and we now are working to fracture him. Phase one of the military campaign is complete,” Warren told Pentagon reporters, noting that this initial step was to “degrade” the IS group by stopping it from making additional territo-rial gains. “We are now in phase two, which is to dismantle this enemy,” he added.

Warren said the final phase of the campaign is to ensure the IS group is dealt a lasting defeat, by enabling local forces to prevent a resurgence of jihadist influence. Deputy Secretary of State Antony Blinken said IS’s ranks have been pared back in Iraq and Syria to their lowest level since Washing-ton began monitoring the group.

Though the IS group maintains a firm grip on vast areas of the two countries, the jihadists have suffered some serious setbacks including the loss of Ramadi in Iraq.

“While IS can still put together some complex attacks, they have not been able to take hold of any key terrain for almost a year now,” Warren said.

“We’ve struck leaders, supply lines, fighters, industrial base and funding sources in both Iraq and Syria.”

AFP

MEXICO CITY: Dozens of Mexican prisons are overcrowded and run by inmates, with many sneaking televi-sions, cellphones and weapons into their cells, a human rights body said.

The governmental National Human Rights Commission said in a report that 71 state and six federal penitentiaries—out of more than 150 prisons—are too crowded.

The overpopulation list includes the 836-capacity Altiplano maxi-mum-security prison, which houses

the infamous leader of the Sinaloa drug cartel leader, Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman, along with more than 1,000 other inmates. The problems stems in part from the fact that 40 percent of inmates are kept behind bars even though they are still waiting for rul-ings in their cases.

The commission also found that inmates govern themselves in 71 state prisons, but not in any of the federal jailhouses.

“There’s possession of objects that are inappropriate, from cellphones to televisions and weapons,” said Ruth Villanueva, a commission expert.

Some privileged inmates have one or two cells all to their own, while in some cases 30 prisoners share a cell meant for four people, Villanueva said. Two recent cases have put a spotlight on Mexico’s prison prob-lem: Guzman’s escape in July 2015 and a brawl that left 49 inmates dead at another penitentiary in February.

Guzman was recaptured in Jan-uary and sent back to the Altiplano, where authorities have imposed extraordinary security measures, including placing rebar in the con-crete floors to prevent another tunnel escape and posting a guard outside

his cell 24 hours per day.Following the deadly riot at the

Topo Chico prison in northern Nuevo Leon state, authorities found “luxury cells” with portable saunas, aquari-ums and even one bar.

Guzman’s escape and the Topo Chico brawl “demonstrated the vulnerabilities and flaws of our pen-itentiary system,” said commission president Luis Raul Gonzalez.

“We can’t wait for grave evens to happen in a prison to look at the existing problem in this area and implement actions that, in most cases, are stopgap measures,” he said.

Hackers helped

FBI crack San

Bernardino

iPhone: Report

AFP

WASHINGTON: Professional hackers discovered at least one software flaw that helped the FBI break into an iPhone used by a San Bernardino attacker, the Washing-ton Post reported.

These hackers were paid a one-time flat fee for their help, the Post said, quoting people familiar with the case.

The discovery of the flaw was used to fashion a piece of hard-ware that helped US authorities dodge the iPhone’s four-digit personal identification number without activating a feature that would have erased all the data on the phone, the Post quoted the people familiar with the case as saying.

The FBI would not have had trouble cracking the four-digit PIN. The tricky part, in fact, was to deactivate a feature on the phone that erases data stored on the device after 10 incorrect tries at guessing the code, the Post said.

In the San Bernardino attacks, Syed Farook and wife Tashfeen Malik killed 14 people on Decem-ber 2 before dying in a firefight with police. Two other phones linked to the pair were found destroyed after the attack.

The government filed suit to try to force Apple to help it break into a phone used by one of the shooters. Apple, backed by other tech giants such as Google and Facebook, refused, citing concerns over digital security and privacy.

AFP

PANAMA CITY: Police raided the headquarters of the Panama law firm whose leaked documents have unleashed a global scandal over how the world’s elite use offshore com-panies to hide their wealth.

Organised crime police sur-rounded Mossack Fonseca’s headquarters in Panama City as the offices were being searched, along with several other branches.

Prosecutors said the raids had taken place “with no incident or interference,” but gave no details on the results of the searches.

The fallout from the Panama Papers, which law firm Mossack Fonseca claims were stolen when hackers from abroad breached its system, has spread around the world.

A year-long probe by a consor-tium of investigative journalists examined the papers, which come from around 214,000 offshore enti-ties and cover almost 40 years.

The world’s business, politi-cal and even sports elite have been thrown onto the defensive.

Iceland’s prime minister was forced to resign after it emerged he owned shares in the country’s banks through an offshore company

during the financial crisis. Panama has hit back at the

apparent blemish on its image as an important financial crossroads.

It warned France of unspecified diplomatic measures if France does not remove it from a blacklist of tax havens. Paris put Panama back on its national list of uncooperative juris-dictions, after removing it in 2012, in the wake of the leaks.

Australia’s tax commissioner has also said he intends to propose a plan to pool international data to hunt tax dodgers at an upcoming meeting of global tax officials in Paris.

Chris Jordan told a local financial newspaper the probe would be based on a six-country collaboration he set up in 2012 to investigate the world’s largest e-commerce companies.

“We’re basically trying to get the bigger picture,” he told the Austral-ian Financial Review. “It’s never been tried on this scale before.”

The European Union unveiled plans yesterday to force the world’s biggest multinationals to faithfully report earnings and pay their fair share of taxes, saying the Panama Papers scandal added to the need for change. Its executive arm said that under the new rules, big companies operating in Europe would have to make public what they earn in each member state of the 28-nation bloc.

AP

DENVER: The man who acknowl-edges killing three people at a Colorado Planned Parenthood clinic idolised an abortion foe who killed a Florida doctor more than two dec-ades earlier, court documents show.

Robert Dear told police he attacked the clinic in Colorado Springs because he was upset with the health organisation for “the sell-ing of baby parts,” according to the court documents, which give the deepest look yet into his seething disdain for abortion providers. Dear also told investigators he put glue in the locks at an abortion clinic when he lived in South Carolina, a common protest technique among activists try-ing to shut down such facilities.

The documents were unsealed after a section of media petitioned the state’s highest court for their release. Judge Gilbert Martinez ini-tially refused to make them public,

saying the media do not have a First Amendment right to access court documents, which prompted the monthslong court fight over records that are routinely released in crimi-nal cases. They include Dear’s arrest warrant and applications for warrants to search Dear’s pickup truck, com-puter, emails and tumbledown trailer in rural Hartsel, Colorado.

Dear, 57, is charged with 179 counts, including murder, attempted murder and assault, in the Novem-ber 27 attack. He held police at bay for more than five hours at the clinic, injuring nine others and forcing the evacuation of hundreds of people from surrounding businesses. As he was being put in a patrol car, Dear began yelling about the killing of babies and “no more baby parts,” according to the court documents.

The dead included a police officer from the University of Colorado, Colo-rado Springs, and two people who were accompanying friends to the clinic separately.

In courtroom outbursts, Dear

declared himself a “warrior for the babies” and said he was guilty. A hearing this month will reveal more about whether he is competent to continue with his criminal case.

The documents show Dear had been nursing a grudge against abor-tion providers for years.

He told police he admired Paul Hill, a former minister, who was exe-cuted in 2003 for the 1994 shootings of abortion provider Dr John Bayard Britton and his bodyguard, a retired US Air Force officer named James Herman Barrett, outside the Ladies Centre in Pensacola, Florida.

Hill himself said he was inspired by shooting death of another doctor in Pensacola a year earlier. At the time of Hill’s execution, some urged that he be spared for fear the extreme wing of the anti-abortion movement would turn him into a martyr.

Hours after the gunbattle, dur-ing an interview, Dear told police he dreamed he would be “met by all the aborted fetuses at the gates of heaven and they would thank him for what he

did because his actions saved lives of other unborn fetuses,” the documents say. “He was happy with what he had done because his actions ... ensured that no more abortions would be con-ducted at the Planned Parenthood facility in Colorado Springs,” which has since reopened.

Before the shooting, Dear fre-quently posted messages online about his anti-abortion views, he told police. In 2009, he emailed his son a link to a website that has the stated purpose of “honouring heroes who stood up for the unborn,” with links to informa-tion about Hill and others who had targeted abortion clinics.

Dear asked several people for directions to the Planned Parent-hood, finally getting the address by calling the clinic.

He wore a homemade ballistic vest made from silver coins and duct tape when he barged into the clinic with four rifles, according to the doc-uments. He told police he had other weapons, including two handguns and a shotgun, in his truck.

Fraud case: Kirchner appears in court

Former Argentine President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner waves after delivering a speech to supporters in front of the Federal Court in Buenos Aires, yesterday.

Overcrowded Mexican prisons run by inmates

Police raid office of Panama law firm

Police officers stand guard at the entrance of the Mossack Fonseca law firm office in Panama City.

Planned Parenthood shooter admired doctor’s killer

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LISSE: Millions of bulbs have blos-somed in a riot of colour from Delft blues to reds and porcelain whites, drawing huge crowds to an annual Dutch springtime rite at the renowned Keukenhof gardens.

The world’s largest bulb gar-den, which boasts some seven million flowers, has depicted in flowers this year’s theme of the Netherlands Golden Age.

Lasting from 1584-1702, this was a time of unparallelled pros-perity for the small nation during which everything from “trade, art and science” flourished, said guide

Patricia Jelgehuis. Thousands of tulips — the country’s most iconic flower — sway gently among grape hyacinths and crocuses of every shade and hue to create the gar-den’s colourful living tableaux.

The highlight this year is a bulb mosaic of the Golden Age, depicting a traditional Delft blue-and-white tile showing Dutch trade across the seas and Amsterdam’s grand, tow-ering canalside homes.

Other exhibits at the gardens in the western town of Lisse high-light copies of the works of famous Dutch Masters, like Rembrandt and Vermeer. And in case the humble tulip is not enough for the 800,000 people expected to visit before the park closes again on May 16, this

year’s show also includes a pair-ing of exotic orchids with high-end fashion.

Visitors can admire dresses, shoes and hats in a bold entwin-ing of material and flowers. There’s even a creamy white wedding dress by Dutch haute couture designer Ronald Kolk, proudly displaying a cascade of orchids as part of the voluminous skirt.

Adding to the decadent display are hats by Philip Treacy, milliner to such clients as the British royal family and stars like Madonna.

It’s the 67th annual springtime display at the Keukenhof gardens, created in 1857 and modelled on English gardens of the period, con-taining some 20 floral displays.

NEW YORK: Ian Burkhart was only 19 when the accident happened. He had been swimming in the Outer Banks with some buddies when a wave caught him and hurled him into a sandbar, leav-ing him paralysed from the neck down. But he always held out hope that medical science would one day be able to help him regain enough move-ment to become more independent.

That day has finally arrived. Scientists reported yesterday in the journal Nature that they have been able to implant a chip in Burkhart’s brain that sends signals to an array of 130 elec-trodes embedded in a “sleeve” he wears on his arm that has given him the ability to move his hand with significant accuracy. Holding a glass with water and pouring it out. Using a stick to stir the contents of a jar. Swiping a credit card.

These are the movements of mundane, daily life that many of us take for granted. But for Bur-khart it’s nothing short of a miracle. “The first time I was able to open and close my hands it really gave me a sense of hope for the future,” Burkhart, now 24, said in a call with reporters.

Lead researchers Chad Bouton, Nick Annetta and Ali Rezai said the effort took a multi-disciplinary team of scientists from neurosurgery to electrical engineering. The technique they used involves reconnecting the brain to the body by bypassing the damaged spinal cord. For the interface to work, Burkhart concentrates on the movement he wants to make and a computer connected to the chip translates those signals into something his muscles understand. It turns out that each person has his or her own unique language that makes the machine a kind of “interpreter”.

The study marks the first time a paralyzed patient has been able to regain movement in his own body — a total of six different wrist and hand motions — by using signals that originated within the brain.

Brain chip gives paralysed man ability to hold cup

Tulips at the world’s largest bulb garden of Keukenhof in Lisse.

Dutch bulb garden depicts Golden Age

Saudi minister rules out oil output cut

PAGE | 22 PAGE | 24

Georgetown University organises lecture on

Black Money

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THURSDAY 14 APRIL 2016 • 7 Rajab 1437 @peninsulaqatar @peninsula_qatarthepeninsulaqatar

The Peninsula

DOHA: Qatar Islamic Bank’s (QIB) net profit attributable to the shareholders of amounted to QR492m for the first quarter of 2016, up 23 percent from a year ago. Total assets of the bank has increased by 3 percent compared to December 2015 and now stands at QR131bn driven by a continued growth in the financing activities.

Financing activities have now reached QR91bn having added QR4bn representing 4 percent increase com-pared to December 2015. Customer Deposits of the Bank now stand at QR 89bn and Total Shareholders’ Equity of the bank has reached QR13bn.

Total income for the three month period ended 31 March 2016 has reached QR1.28bn compared to QR950m by end of March 2015. Income from financing and invest-ing activities reached QR1.1bn at the end of March 2016 compared to QR817m for the three month period ended March 2015. Net fee and commission income reached QR133m at the end of March 2016 compared to QR100m for the three month period ended March 2015.

QIB was able to further improve the ratio of non-per-forming financing portfolio to gross financing portfolio

to less than 1 percent, one of the lowest in the indus-try, reflecting the quality of the Bank’s financing assets portfolio and its effective risk management framework. The Bank continued to pursue the conservative impair-

ment policy with an improved coverage ratio for non-performing financing portfolio at 112 percent as of March 2016.

International ratings agency Capital Intelli-gence has in April 2016 reaffirmed QIB’s Financial Strength Rating of ‘A’ with a stable outlook in view of very good asset quality, strong capi-tal ratios and improved coverage ratio. Fitch, in 2015 has upgraded QIB’s Long Term IDR to ‘A+’ from the previously held ‘A’ with a stable outlook. Standard & Poor’s Rating Services has retained QIB’s Counterparty Credit Rating at ‘A-’ with a stable outlook. In light of QIB’s

positive performance, the bank has been recognised by highly influential international financial publications and reports as one of the leading regional Banks in 2016. One of QIB’s latest commendations goes to its Group CEO, Bas-sel Gamal, who was ranked the first of 100 best-performing CEOs of listed companies in the GCC states from TRENDS & INSEAD Business School. QIB has also won other substan-tial awards such as: Bank of the Year 2015 in Qatar by the Banker Magazine, and has been recognised by the Islamic Finance News (IFN) for being the ‘Best Islamic Bank in Qatar’ and for the ‘Best Deal of the Year - Reg-ulatory Capital’ in relation to its QR2bn Sukuk deal.

QIB records QR492m net profit in Q1; total assets at QR131bn

By Sachin Kumar

The Peninsula

DOHA: Minister of Economy and Commerce H E Sheikh Ahmed bin Jassim Al Thani has stated strength-ening Qatar’s Small and Medium Enterprises (SME) sector will further boost the country’s ongoing efforts to diversify its economy. Delivering the opening speech at the 12th Annual Meeting of International Network for SMEs (INSME 2016) yesterday, the Minister said government is keen to strengthen role of SMEs in the econ-omy.

To help remove obstacles that hinder the growth of Qatari SMEs, the ministry has issued the new compa-nies law, which is an important step in the transactions of the business sector, especially in the field of estab-lishing companies promoting ease of doing business, added the Minister.

Qatari economy has gradually transformed from an oil-based econ-omy to a knowledge-based economy in order to strengthen the non-oil and gas sector and the role of such sec-tors has seen significant growth by 7.4 percent in the last quarter of 2015. Qatar’s economy was able to over-come recent global slowdown due to its strong legislation and laws, said the minister.

The Minister added that the min-istry has adopted and provided a range of initiatives and programmes to support SMEs, including the

launching of comprehensive appli-cations to encourage SME owners and entrepreneurs to establish their busi-nesses and projects.

Abdul Aziz bin Nasser Al Khal-ifa, CEO of Qatar Development Bank highlighted the efforts made by QDB to support and develop SMEs. He said QDB organised 66 work-shops for SMEs in 2015. Around 550 entrepreneurs participated in these workshops and funding to different institutions reached $4.5bn.

“Hosting such an influential global industry event shows the pres-tigious reputation Qatar has built as a thriving business and investment destination, and its recognised efforts to SMEs and private sector growth. During the event, Qatar Develop-ment Bank will share its experience in supporting SMEs and the success we have achieved in this area through

innovative financing and advisory programs, along with marketing and logistical support. For example ‘Jahiz’ that provides fully equipped facil-ities and tailored special services for Qatari entrepreneurs to encour-age manufacturing. Following this, we can then help build and sell their products globally through our ‘Tasdeer’ export program,” said Al Khalifa. “We are always happy to host such events that enable us to share and exchange knowledge with international insti-tutions and organizations, allowing us to explore new innovations and help identify further ways to diver-sify Qatar’s economy to achieve Qatar National Vision 2030,” he added.

INSME is a legally recognised not-for-profit association open to international membership based in Italy. It was established 12 years ago and comprises of 77 members across

The Peninsula

DOHA: Despite a potential near term oversupply of liquefied natural gas (LNG), investment in new liquefaction projects will be crucial to avoid a possible under-supply situation in the early 2020s, cautioned RasGas Company Limited’s (RasGas) Chief Execu-tive Officer, Hamad Mubarak Al Muhannadi, at the LNG 18 Inter-national Conference and Exhibition on Liquefied Natural Gas, in Perth, Australia.

In his speech titled, ‘The

Globalisation of Gas’, Al Muhan-nadi examined the LNG industry’s changing market dynamics, focusing on the past decade’s rapid increase in production capacity and liquidity, and ever-growing global LNG demand.

“Worldwide, LNG production has increased to over 230 million tonnes per year, and we expect it to further increase to approx-imately 370 million tonnes per year by 2020 from develop-ments under construction or projects that have reached FID,” he confirmed.

Yet the growth in demand for LNG has been as significant:

“Approximately 30 countries currently import LNG, twice the number of countries import-ing just 10 years ago, and RasGas anticipates that the pace of growth will continue, and that many more customers and coun-tries will be importing LNG in the next decade.”

Given this significant increase in global demand, Al Muhannadi indicated that under supply could be the market reality in the early 2020s “if no new projects are sanctioned”. More than 2,000 delegates attended the 18th International Conference and Exhibition.

Focus on new LNG projects crucial: RasGas CEO

RasGas CEO Hamad Mubarak Al Muhannadi speaking at the LNG 18 conference in Perth, Australia.

Prime Minister and Interior Minister H E Sheikh Abdullah bin Nasser bin Khalifa Al Thani with Lord O’Neill of Gatley, Commercial Secretary to the Treasury, United Kingdom. Talks covered bilateral trade relations.

PM meets UK Commercial Secretary

Reuters

DUBAI: Qatar’s central bank has issued new maximum limits on open posi-tions that banks can hold in foreign currency, according to a circular that was sent to banks last wee. The circular set the maximum limit for dollar open positions - surplus and deficit - at 25 per cent of capital and reserves, while the limit set for all other foreign currencies was set at 5 per cent.

The aggregate open positions for all foreign currencies combined was set at 30 per cent of bank capital and reserves, the circular said.

In its brief circular, the central bank said it was “keen to limit the risks of foreign currency open positions”. It did not elaborate and central bank officials could not be reached to comment on Tuesday.

Banks have a 12-month grace period to comply to the new regulations, the circular said. Under the previous regulations, lenders’ foreign currency assets must be at least equal to their liabilities, traders said.

Qatar keen to strengthen SME sector: Minister

Qatar sets new regulations for banks’ foreign currency holdings

Minister of Economy and Commerce H E Sheikh Ahmed bin Jassim Al Thani speaking at the 12th Annual Meeting of International Network for SMEs. Pic: A Basit/The Peninsula

The ministry has issued new law, which is an important step in the transactions of the business sector, especially in the field of establishing companies promoting ease of doing business.

QE 10,245.87 -0.42 PTS

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BRENT $41.63 -$0.54

BUSINESS22 THURSDAY 14 APRIL 2016

The Peninsula

MANAMA: Gulf Air, the King-dom of Bahrain’s national carrier, recently launched an exclusive offer for the airline’s Falconflyer loyalty programme members offering 50% off Falconflyer miles redemption. Customers can redeem their Falcon-flyer miles for Gulf Air tickets – at a 50% discounted rate – between now and 30th June 2016.

The airline’s 50% discount* offer is available to Falconflyer members when redeeming Fal-conflyer miles online at gulfair.com, via any local Gulf Air office or by calling the airline’s 24 hour Worldwide Contact Centre at (+973) 17373737. The 50% redemption promotion is valid from today until 30th June 2016. Enrolling in the Gulf Air FalconFlyer Programme and/or booking Gulf Air flights across the airline’s 39 destination network can be done online at gul-fair.com, by calling the airline’s 24 hour Worldwide Contact Cen-tre on (+973) 17373737, or through any Gulf Air sales office.

The Peninsula

DUBAI: Mövenpick Hotels & Resorts (MHR) has revealed plans to open its first hotel and apartment property in Jeddah in 2017 in a bid to meet strong demand for branded extended-stay accommodation in Saudi Arabia’s booming seaport city.

The Swiss hospitality firm has signed an agreement with prominent real estate and investment company, Hadia Abdul Latif Jameel Group, to manage the 164-unit Mövenpick Hotel & Apartments Al Tahlia Jeddah, which will command a sought-after location on Hail Street, close to Jed-dah’s major commercial, financial, consular and shopping districts.

With the modern-day corporate traveller in mind, the property, part of a high-profile mixed-use develop-ment, features predominantly suites, an all-day-dining outlet, a casual fine-food Indian restaurant, a gym with two spa treatment rooms, and four meeting rooms.

“It’s a flexible hotel and apart-ment model that caters to both short- and long-stay clients,

capitalising on the gap in the market for branded extended-stay accom-modation,” explained Mr. Andreas Mattmüller, Chief Operating Officer, Mövenpick Hotels & Resorts Middle East and South Asia.

Mövenpick Hotel & Apartments Al Tahlia will be strategically located next to Jameel Square, a Grade-A office building also developed by the Hadia Abdul Latif Jameel Group, that is occupied by local and multi-national blue-chip corporate tenants.

“This modern property with its prime location and efficient design, will provide Jeddah’s growing cor-porate community with a fresh new concept that caters to their business and leisure needs right on their door-step.” added Mr. Osama Al Haddad,

President, Hadia Abdul Latif Jameel Group.

Signing Mövenpick Hotel & Apart-ments Al Tahlia helps to consolidate MHR’s position as a market leader in Jeddah where the company cur-rently operates two properties, but now has three pipelined, taking its total number of keys in the city to 923 across five hotels by 2018.

Mövenpick Hotels & Resorts plans to increase its KSA footprint by one-third, from a current 10 properties (3,907 keys) to 15 (5,204) by 2018. Upcoming projects include Möven-pick Hotel City Star Jeddah, opening this year, Mövenpick Residences Al Khobar (2017), Mövenpick Hotel Financial District Riyadh (2017) and Mövenpick Hotel Heraa Jeddah (2018).

The Peninsula

DOHA: Todd Cilano (pictured), has been appointed Regional Vice Pres-ident and General Manager and of Four Seasons Hotel Doha. Cilano will be responsible for oversee-ing the Hotel, along with regional responsibilities supervising Four Seasons Hotels & Resorts in Mauri-tius, Seychelles, Johannesburg, and the Serengeti Lodge in Tanzania,

He makes the move to Doha from Four Seasons Resort Mauritius, where he successfully served in a similar role as Regional Vice President and Gen-eral Manager. Under his leadership, Mauritius was continuously recog-nized as one of the top resorts in the world by well-respected travel author-ities, including Forbes Travel Guide and TripAdvisor.

Joining Four Seasons in 1995, Cilano brings a wealth of luxury hos-pitality and management experience to Doha, along with a strong under-standing of the Middle East having spent his time at the Four Sea-sons Hotel Alexandria and Riyadh.

Throughout his 21-year career, Cilano has worked in eight differ-ent countries, leaving his mark at 11 Four Seasons propertieswith previ-ous positions at Four Seasons Hotel Alexandria; Four Seasons Resort Chiang Mai and Four Seasons Tented Camp Golden Triangle in Thailand; Four Seasons Hotel Bangkok; Four Seasons Hotel London; Four Seasons Hotel Riyadh; Four Seasons Resort Nevis in the West Indies; Four Sea-sons Resort The Biltmore at Santa Barbara; and Four Seasons Hotel Washington, D. C., and most recently Four Seasons Resort Mauritius.

Todd Cilano appointed as regional VP and GM of Four Seasons Hotel Doha

The Peninsula

DOHA: International brand German Doner Kebab has extended its reach to Qatar and is all set now to satisfy the taste buds of foodies in Doha. Currently with 40 outlets globally, the brand is set to open more outlets in the region to meet the high demand for the original German Doner Kebab. At German Doner Kebab, the authen-tic kebabs are big in flavour and size, and you will definitely keep com-ing back for more. In contrast to the traditional unhealthy image of kebabs, German Doner Kebab offers a gourmet food experience free from additives and preservatives.

The launch of the brand was cel-ebrated in style, with German Doner Kebab formally opening the doors to the residents of Qatar through a VIP event. The best and most dedicated

foodies of Qatar all enjoyed a scrumptious meat loaded menu with delicious vegetarian options availa-ble as well.

German Doner Kebab was brought to Qatar by Al Siddiqi Hospi-tality, the hospitality arm of Al Siddiqi Holding, which operates some of the most widely recognized restaurants in the country. The new brand was added to the Al Siddiqi portfolio thanks to the partnership fostered by Mohammed Al Siddiqi - Managing Director of Al Siddiqi Holding, Dinesh Chadha - CEO of Al Siddiqi Holding, and Imran Sayeed - COO of German Doner Kebab.

Free parking is available at Medina Centrale, The Pearl-Qatar near Spinneys and Novo Cinemas.

Opening hours:Sunday – Wednesday: 11am -

11:30pm, Thursdays and Saturdays: 11am - 12 am and Fridays: 1pm - 12 am

German Doner Kebab outlet opens in Qatar

Gulf Air offers 50 percent off on miles redemption

Lord of the Wings at Pearl-QatarDOHA: Lord of the Wings has landed in Qatar. Newly launched in the country with its first branch opening at Medina Centrale, on the prestigious Pearl-Qatar, Lord of the Wings is all set to delight food lovers and give everyone the best wings and burgers experience that exceeds the expectations of the pickiest of wings aficionados.

Lord of the Wings is a contem-porary American casual diner that features a full dine-in menu that makes it the ultimate casual din-ing destination for urban foodies in Qatar.

With four types of wings to choose from, and 16 different sauces that range in flavour from mild honey mustard to fiery buffalo suicide, in addition to Craft burgers that are customizable so you can build your perfect burger, Lord of the Wings is

definitely not your average restau-rant. For the dedicated wings fans, enjoy unlimited wings with bot-tomless sauces, or try your hand at the Hot Wings challenge where you devour 8 fiery wings to the bone (– if you can handle it, that is!).

Opening hours:Sunday – Wednesday: 11am –

12am, Thursdays and Saturdays: 11am – 1am, Fridays: 1pm – 1am.

Free parking is available at Medina Centrale, The Pearl-Qatar near Spinneys and Novo Cinemas.

The Peninsula

DOHA: Dr Reem Al Ansari, a pro-fessor at Qatar University’s College of Law and the 2015-2016 CIRS Qatar University Fellow at Georgetown Uni-versity in Qatar delivered a lecture on ‘Black Money’ at International and Regional Studies (CIRS) Monthly Dia-logue Lecture Series.

Defining the term “money laun-dering”, she said money laundering refers to an amount of money leav-ing from destination A, and using techniques to make it seem like the funds were obtained from destination B, a legal source.” Once the money has moved through several banks

in several countries, it can then be returned to its owner, ready to be used as legitimate funds.

Adding that Qatar is also a tar-get of this criminal activity, she said: “Qatari authorities have responded to the threat of money launder-ing aggressively with the National Money Law in 2010.” This compre-hensive law was enacted following the unsatisfactory conclusion of an IMF-led evaluation report of Qatar’s banking system. “That was Qatar’s awakening to the threat, and it led to the new law.”

Further strengthening Qatar’s anti-corruption commitment, she added that, “Qatar now adheres to the series of recommendations that FATF has developed and that set the

international standard for combat-ing of money laundering,” referring to the nation’s membership to the Financial Action Task Force, an intergovernmental policy-making body, established in 1989 to pro-mote effective implementation of measures for combating threats to the integrity of the international financial system.

The consequences of unchecked money laundering, she concluded, are severe, including increased criminal activity and currency inflation in developing economies, which bear the consequences of eco-nomic collapse when critical funds simply disappear as they continue through the multi-step money clean-ing process.

Movenpick to roll out new hotel and apartment concept in Jeddah

Georgetown University organises lecture on Black Money

By Mohammad Shoeb

The Peninsula

DOHA: Qatar’s inflation, based on consumer price index (CPI), rose 3.3 percent year-on-year (y-o-y) in March 2016, while the index (which was estimated at 107.6) remained stable when compared on month-on-month (m-o-m) basis to the CPI of February 2016, figures released by the Ministry of Development Plan-ning and Statistics (MDPS) revealed.

The rise in annual inflation was primarily attributed to the increas-ing prices seen in the eight groups, namely: “Recreation and Culture” by 11.2 percent (witnessed the

highest surge prices), followed by rising cost of “Education” which became 7.1 percent expensive than a year ago.

The prices of “Housing, Water, Electricity and Gas” surged by 5.4 percent, “Furniture and House-hold Equipment” and “Transport“ by 1.5 percent each, “Miscellaneous Goods and Services” by 1.4 percent, “Restaurants and Hotels” by 1.1 per-cent, and “Communication” by 0.2 percent.

Also, there has been a decrease in price levels in other groups, namely: “Food and Beverages” by 1.9 percent, “Health” by 0.3 percent. No change has been recorded in “Clothing and Footwear” and “Tobacco” groups.

When compared on m-o-m basis, the CPI for March, 2016 (compared with the CPI of February, 2016), showed that there were five main groups, where

respective indices in this month have risen, namely: “Recreation and Culture” rose by 0.7 percent. “Clothing and Foot-wear”, “Restaurants and Hotels, and “Miscellaneous Goods and Services” witnessed marginal increase of 0.4 percent each. “Housing, Water, Elec-tricity and Gas” by 0.1 percent.

A decline in prices was also noticed in “Food and Beverages” by 0.7 per-cent, “Transport” by 0.6 percent. The other groups: “Tobacco”, “Furniture and Household Equipment”, “Health”, “Communication”, and “Education” have remained flat at the last month’s price level.

The CPI of March, 2016 exclud-ing “Housing, Water, Electricity and Gas” group stood at 105.4, recorded stability when compared to the index of February 2016, and an increase of 2.6 percent in comparison to the CPI of March, 2015.

Dinesh Chadha (left), CEO of Al Siddiqi Holding and Marc Moudabber-Brand Owner, jointly opening the outlet at Medina Centrale, at The Pearl-Qatar.

Qatar’s annual inflation rate hits 3.3% in March

Dr Reem Al Ansari delivering the lecture.

The rise in annual inflation was primarily attributed to the increasing prices seen in the eight groups, namely “Recreation and Culture” by 11.2 percent followed by rising cost of “Education” which became 7.1 percent expensive than a year ago.

BUSINESS 23THURSDAY 14 APRIL 2016

The Peninsula

DOHA: Qatar Petroleum (QP), along with its joint venture companies Ras-Gas Company Limited and Qatargas Operating Company Limited, took

part in the 18th International Con-ference & Exhibition on Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG 18), which began on Tuesday in Perth, Australia.

LNG 18 is considered as the pre-mier event for the world’s LNG industry as it features the largest number of high-level LNG industry leaders as plenary speakers. The four-day event is presented by the International Gas Union (IGU), the Gas Technology Institute (GTI) and the International Institute of Refrig-eration (IIR), with the support of the Australian Petroleum Produc-tion & Exploration Association Ltd. (APPEA).

QP joins other major oil & gas companies exhibiting at LNG 18 at the Perth Convention and Exhibi-tion Centre. The QP exhibition stand showcases the activities of the corpo-ration’s Industrial Cities Directorate as well as the operations of Qatargas and RasGas, which is also a “Glo-bal Sponsor” of the event. The stand prominently highlights the State of

Qatar’s current standing as the world’s No. 1 producer and exporter of LNG, with its 77 million tonnes per annum (mta) of LNG production capacity.

The delegation from Qatar is headed by Hamad Mubarak Al-Muhannadi, Chief Executive Officer

of RasGas, who delivered a speech at the event’s second plenary session, which focused on the topic “The Glo-balisation of Gas.”

Many members of the Qatari delegation are attending the LNG 18 conference, with two senior officials

from Qatargas also set to deliver presentations in the commercial and special interest streams of the conference sessions. Their presen-tations focused on the incentives needed to meet future LNG demand and their program for effective

flare reduction in the LNG industry.LNG 18 has attracted the par-

ticipation of over 5,000 industry professionals from over 60 countries worldwide. In addition to the con-ference and exhibition, the event also features workshops, a training course on the basics of LNG, poster sessions, a student forum, networking oppor-tunities, and technical tours to major LNG facilities in Australia. The over-all theme of the event is “Redrawing the Global Map of Gas” to empha-size the changing LNG market realities due to various factors such as international trade, geopolitics, technological innovations, invest-ments and regulations.

First launched in Chicago, Illinois, in 1968, the International Conference & Exhibition on Liquefied Natural Gas is organized every three years, and the 14th edition of the event was hosted in Doha, Qatar, way back in 2004. The next event, LNG 19, will be held in Shanghai, China, on April 1-5, 2019.

QP highlights Qatar’s LNG activities at LNG 18

Qatari delegation at LNG 18 in Perth, Australia.

The Peninsula

DOHA: Rashid bin Ali Al Mansoori, CEO of Qatar Exchange (QE) high-lighted the role of Qatari bourse during a discussion panel organised recently by the Investment Club at Georgetown University in Qatar (GU-Q) to mark the launch of the club’s new magazine.

Al Mansoori explained the role of the stock market in encourag-ing companies to list on the market and boosting liquidity and its role in offering diversified investment opportunities to both local and inter-national investors and achieving the best international transparency and disclosure practices.

At the Investment Club event, the CEO took part in a Q&A about the industry and had a discussion with the club’s faculty advisor Dr Christine Schiwietz, who is also the assistant dean for academic affairs at GU-Q, on the role of QE in serving the national economy as well as the developments and achievements seen in the past five years.

He also briefed the audience on the investment tools and prod-ucts available at Qatar Exchange for all types of retail and institutional investors.

QE’s support of and contribution to educational, training and aware-ness activities are part of its social responsibility in supporting all seg-ments of the local community, in line with QNV 2030 focusing on

the human and economic develop-ment. Based on this responsibility, QE frequently participates in student activities and forums that constitute a vital part of the educational process, where learning happens outside the classroom. By engaging in real world events and challenging students to grapple with the same opportunities and risks that are present in invest-ment banking, they learn about their

world through a hands-on approach, while also serving as leaders in their communities.

The club, which is entirely stu-dent-developed and student-driven, is committed to developing an active investment banking culture by giving GU-Q students a chance to develop and pitch investment ideas, create mock stock portfolios and under-take other projects associated with investment banking. The magazine provides an in-depth look at various aspects of the industry, and echoes voices and opinions from global and local leaders within this field.

As part of its social responsibil-ity activities, QE signed cooperation agreements with several Qatari-based educational institutions such as the Faculty of Islamic Studies of HBK University, Carnegie Mellon University, and Qatar University in order to promote investment aware-ness among various segments of the society. These agreements resulted in various education and training initiatives and programmes that targeted university students as well as various segments of citizens and residents.

The Peninsula

DOHA: Commercial Bank, has announced winners of its Debit Card campaign, which rewarded its Sadara and Personal Banking customers for using their Commercial Bank Debit Cards overseas, by giving them a chance to win up to QR5,000 worth of Dnata travel vouchers.

Commercial Bank customers who used their Commercial Bank Debit Card for an overseas transac-tion; either an ATM cash withdrawal, an online transaction, or a transac-tion at a merchant outlet during the promotion period, had the opportu-nity to win up to QR5,000 worth of Dnata travel vouchers.

The campaign highlights the con-venience of using Commercial Bank Debit Cards for transactions while at home or abroad, as they eliminate the need to withdraw and carry large amounts of cash. Commercial Bank

Debit Cards are safe and easy to use, employing Chip & PIN technology and are also 3D Secure enabled, offering Debit Card customers security and peace of mind when they use their cards for online purchases.

Dean Proctor, Commercial Bank

EGM, Chief Consumer and Private Banking said: “Commercial Bank Debit Cards are safe to use when spending locally in Qatar, overseas when travelling and online, employ-ing the latest technology and security standards to ensure our customers

benefit from having seamless access to their money, from anywhere in the world. Throughout this campaign, our aim was to highlight to customers the benefits of using their Commercial Bank Debit cards and to reward them for their usage.”

Commercial Bank names debit card campaign winners

The winners with Commercial Bank officials.

Al Mansoori explains role of Qatar ExchangeThe Peninsula

DOHA: Qatar is often perceived to be a low tax, or even a ‘no tax’ area, how-ever, a recent survey of the region’s tax and finance leaders shows that man-aging tax in the region can be complex and challenging.

PwC Middle East recently launched its latest tax survey Managing tax which discusses tax and business challenges that companies in the region face, the way their tax functions are organised, and the impact of international and domestic tax reforms. “Tax regimes in the region can be complex and challenging to manage and their implementation can give rise to uncer-tainty and confusion, which in turn creates risk. As a result companies need to manage their tax affairs with the same care and attention to detail that applies everywhere else in the world,” says Dean Kern, PwC Middle East Tax and Legal services Leader.

A key theme that emerged from the survey is the lack of clarity in the application of tax law and to some extent what laws are in place. For example in Qatar, foreign investment law does not recognise a permanent establishment of a foreign company that is not registered with the Min-istry of Economy and Commerce as

a temporary branch but the tax law has a much broader definition of perma-nent establishments. This inconsistency can lead to confusion on whether for-eign companies should pay corporation tax and suffer retention payments or be subject to withholding tax.

The reclaim process on reten-tion payments is another area that the survey identifies as an area for review. Currently, when a foreign con-tractor performs its services through a temporary branch, the employing company is required to retain 3 per-cent of the value of the contract or the final payment, whichever is greater. The foreign contractor can only get these funds released once the con-tract is complete, all taxes have been assessed and paid and a No objec-tion certificate is issued by Qatar tax authority. For long term contracts, this can result in a considerable delay in receiving the retention payments.

Neil O’Brien, Head of Tax at PwC Qatar, said: “As the Qatar economy grows, Tax administra-tions are required to manage an increasing number of taxpayers in a timely and efficient manner. Removing uncertainty and consid-ering new models of compliance could provide increased clarity and consistency for taxpayers whilst maintaining resources efficiency for tax administration.”

CEO of Qatar Exchange Rashid bin Ali Al Mansoori during discussion at Georgetown University in Qatar.

Managing tax in the region challenging: PwC

The Peninsula

DOHA: The Gulf IntelligenceQatar Industry Water Security Forum sched-uled to be held at Qatar University’s Research Complex on April 25, will discuss the best strategies for tackling Qatar’s water challenge . Key stake-holders in industry, government and academia will attend the Forum.

The challenge of bettering Qatar’s long-term water security is the third of Qatar’s three Grand Research and

Development (R&D) Challenges, along with energy security and cyber secu-rity. The Gulf Intelligence Forum will focus on the best R&D strategies for innovative technologies that can streamline water management and desalination techniques in Qatar – the clock is ticking and defining efficient strategies is imperative. Cooperation within industry and industry’s cooperation with govern-ment and academia is critical. Qatar only receives on average seven inches of rain per year and 99% of the coun-try’s municipal demand is fed by

desalinated seawater – an expen-sive process.

“A holistic approach is vital when it comes to resolving water scarcity issues in Qatar and beyond. Collabo-ration between industry, government and academia is key to giving the right message to both industries and com-munities on how best to use water in the future,” said Hassan Al Derham, President of Qatar University (QU). “Water scarcity is not a problem that will go away and change is inevitable. How we make that change econom-ical and sustainable is what really

counts.” The oil and gas industry is by far the largest industrial user of freshwater, accounting for more than 15 percent of global usage. Improv-ing the economic value of water usage in Qatar’s industries is rapidly climbing companies’ agendas, be it by recycling, reusing or reducing the consumption of water. The economics behind better water management has come under an even brighter spotlight due to the negative impact of lower oil prices since June 2014; energy compa-nies are streamlining budgets.

“It is a part of Total’s commitment

to support Qatari stakeholders in their move to a more sustainable management of water resources and through open discussions and fruit-ful exchanges, we hope to identify promising ways for efficient reuse of water during oil and gas production”, said Pierre Montaud, Director of Total Research Centre Qatar (TRCQ) “After a collaboration with QEERI on advanced characterization of produced water, we have now initiated a Research partner-ship with Qatar University for beneficial re-use for irrigation. This effort is a con-tribution to global water security. Such

partnerships are a great example of col-laboration and capacity building”, he continued.

During the Gulf Intelligence Qatar Industry Water Security Forum, the top 100 stakeholders impacting water security in Qatar will provide recom-mendations that address critical questions regarding Qatar’s future; Produced Water, Industry Consump-tion, Desalination and Water Technology. The final recommendations put forward during the Forum will be compiled to cre-ate an R&D roadmap that betters Qatar’s long-term water security.

Gulf Intelligence Water Security Forum to discuss Qatar’s water challenges

The QP exhibition showcases the activities of the corporation’s Industrial Cities Directorate as well as the operations of Qatargas and RasGas, which is also a Global Sponsor of the event.

The Peninsula

DOHA: Qatar Insurance Company (QIC) yesterday said that it aims to facil-itated development of Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs).

“As a leading national insurer, it is our duty to facilitate development of SMEs – the engines of economic growth and diversification. In fact, it would be difficult for the region to support the anticipated growth and manage today’s evolving and complex risk landscape without having an insurer to absorb the loss and compensate for damages following an accident,” said Deputy Group President & CEO of QIC – MENA region, Salem Al Mannai.

“As insurers, we play a vital role in facilitating growth of SMEs and start-ups by mitigating risks” said Al Mannai. “Running businesses in today’s world involves plethora of risks. Without having to worry or be baffled by any unforeseen expenses arising out of accidental damage of office building, equipment and machinery, loss of revenue due to property damage, third party or employer’s liability, our package policy Business Shield Insurance caters for all business insurance requirements so that entrepreneurs can allocate more time on nurturing their businesses,” he said.

QIC to be a facilitator for SMEs

Jean-Michel Lamothe (left), a 45-year-old Irishman who has launched a rental site for equipment among farmers, speaks with a farmer in front of a corn thrasher which is for hire, at his property near Mont-de-Marsan in southwestern France.

BUSINESS24 THURSDAY 14 APRIL 2016

Reuters

VIENNA: Opec warned yesterday that the world remains awash with crude ahead of a crunch meeting in Doha between cartel members and other major producers to discuss a produc-tion freeze to boost the oil price.

The Organization of the Petro-leum Exporting Countries said in its April monthly report that oil prices rose more than 20 percent in March,

continuing a slow recovery from the great plunge of 2014-15.

“Positive market sentiments con-tinue to arise from the output freeze plan being considered by major crude exporters,” as well as an expected fall in output in the United States and elsewhere, Opec said.

“Nevertheless, hurdles prevail as oversupply persists and inventories remain high,” it warned.

All oil producers, not just those in the 13-nation Opec but also non-car-tel members like Russia, have suffered from the more than 60-percent drop in oil prices since mid-2014.

An agreement in Doha on Sunday to freeze production would, in theory at least, reduce the glut, boost prices and help repair their in some cases —for example Venezuela — dangerously tattered public finances.

“When there is coordination between major producers in Opec and non-Opec countries, it will certainly help to stabilise prices,” Kuwait’s act-ing oil minister Anas Al Saleh told reporters.

Media reports on Tuesday sug-gested that Russia and Saudi Arabia, two of the world’s biggest producers, had already reached a deal, boosting oil prices to a high for the year. These

fell back slightly yesterday.What would be a momentous

agreement among the 15 or so oil producers — representing some 75 percent of global output — in Doha is far from guaranteed, however. Nor

would it necessarily lift prices.Opec member Iran has so far

rejected attempts to freeze produc-tion as it ramps up output following the lifting of sanctions this year as part of 2015’s nuclear deal with major

powers. Saudi Arabia’s deputy crown prince Mohamed bin Salman has said the kingdom, Opec’s top producer, would only freeze output if Iran and other major producers are also on board. The Opec report showed that

Iranian oil production in March was 3.3 million barrels per day (bpd), up from 2.9 million bpd in January and an average of 2.8 million bpd in 2015.

Saudi oil production by contrast was 10.1 million bpd, unchanged from January or from the kingdom’s aver-age last year. Opec yesterday also trimmed slightly its forecast for global oil demand this year to 94.18 million bpd from its previous projection of 94.23 million bpd, reflecting slowed economic momentum in Latin Amer-ica. In 2015 demand was 92.98 million bpd. On the supply side, Opec kept to its projection that non-Opec output in 2016 would be 56.39 million bpd, down from 57.13 million bpd in 2015, a slightly bigger contraction than pre-viously forecast.

The main reason was lower expectations for crude oil produc-tion from China’s onshore mature fields and further declines in the United States, where shale oil produc-ers have proved surprisingly resilient to the lower oil price. As usual, Opec gave no forecast for its own output this year, saying only that its mem-bers pumped in March 32.25 million bpd, based on secondary sources, up from an average of 31.85 million bpd in 2015.

Opec warns of oversupply ahead of Doha meeting

AFP

RIYADH: Saudi oil minister Ali Al Naimi (pictured), appeared to rule out cutting his country’s oil produc-tion in remarks published yesterday, days ahead of a producers’ meeting aimed at propping up crude prices.

Asked about the kingdom’s posi-tion on reducing output, Naimi said: “Forget about this topic,” Al Hayat daily reported on its website, with-out elaborating.

“Oil prices are always volatile,” he said.

Members of the oil-export-ing cartel Opec and non-Opec

producers will meet Sunday in Doha to discuss freezing produc-tion at January levels. Saudi Arabia’s

production in March remained almost at the same levels as in January.

Iran has said it will not join a freeze as it is still ramping up pro-duction following the lifting of nuclear-linked sanctions in January.

Saudi Arabia’s deputy crown prince Mohammed bin Salman has said the kingdom, Opec’s top pro-ducer, would only freeze output if Iran and other major producers are also on board.

Opec warned yesterday in its April report that the world remains awash with crude, but said oil prices rose more than 20 percent in March, continuing a slow recovery from the huge drop of 2014-15.

Saudi rules out oil output cutOpec member Iran has so far rejected attempts to freeze production as it ramps up output following the lifting of sanctions this year as part of 2015’s nuclear deal with major powers.

Reuters

DUBAI: Riyad Bank, Saudi Arabia’s fourth-largest lender by assets, posted a 0.2 rise in first-quarter net profit yesterday, ahead of ana-lysts’ forecasts.

The bank said it made 1.17 bil-lion riyals ($321.3m) in the three months to Mar. 31, citing an 8.4 percent decline in operating expenses for the marginal increase in earnings.

This helped to offset a 3.5 percent drop in total operating income, which dipped due to a fall in fee and commission income and lower gains from non-trading and investments, it said.

Four analysts polled by Reu-ters had on average forecast the bank’s quarterly profit would be 962.34 million riyals.

Saudi companies issue brief earnings statements early in the reporting period before publishing more detailed results later.

Riyad Bank has been ham-pered in recent quarters by higher provisioning and a rate of loan growth generally below the aver-age for the sector.

It had reported falling earnings in the last three quarters.

Loans and advances at the end of March stood at 152.56 bil-lion riyals, gaining 10.52 percent on the same point of 2015, while deposits edged 0.1 percent up to 165.2 billion riyals over the same period.

Reuters

DUBAI/DELHI: Dubai’s Emaar Properties plans to split with its Indian joint venture partner through a demerger process, the emirate’s biggest property developer said on Wednesday.

The move ends a decade-long relationship between Emaar and MGF Developments through Emaar MGF Land Limited, one which has

seen plenty of struggles along the way including a failed stock mar-ket flotation and delays to many of its projects.

The demerger will “enable Emaar to implement focused strategy for its real estate business in India and will allow the business to undertake future expansion strategies,” as well as drive its ongoing projects, Emaar said in a bourse statement.

It did not provide further details or a time frame for when the demerger would happen, except to

say that it had “agreed to take steps for the reorganisation of Emaar MGF Land Limited”.

Emaar denied speculation in Indian media last July that it was planning a split, insisting that India was a key market for Emaar through Emaar MGF.

The Dubai-based developer, known for building the world’s tall-est building in the emirate, the Burj Khalifa, entered the Indian market in 2005 through its partnership with MGF.

It aimed to build homes, offices and shopping centres for India’s rap-idly-growing middle class as their incomes were rising.

However, it has so far completed only a handful of projects, with many still under construction and suffer-ing from long delays. Emaar MGF Land Limited posted a net loss of 3.53bn rupees ($53m) in 2015, nar-rower than the 3.84bn rupees it lost in the previous year, according to the ICRA ratings agency, which said in a January note that the firm was

constructing 49 projects with total saleable value of 187.45bn rupees.

According to Emaar MGF’s website, it has ongoing projects including in the northern city of Gurgaon, Chennai in the south and Jaipur in the west.

Emaar MGF also came under fire from the government in New Delhi for shoddy construction and months of delays after being contracted to deliver the $230m athletes village for the 2010 Commonwealth Games held in the Indian capital.

AP

HAVANA: Cuba says it is opening its state-controlled wholesale market to a limited number of private business owners in response to rising prices that have angered many ordinary Cubans.

WIthout access to wholesale goods, private business have been buying basic supplies in retail out-lets and raising the prices to generate profit, leading to widespread hikes in the cost of food and many house-hold goods.

State-run media said Wednesday that food and personal-service busi-nesses that are either cooperatively run or rent space from the govern-ment will be able to buy goods at

prices 20 percent below retail. They will also be able to do business with state-run importers, a potentially important new benefit that could give access to US-made goods.

The new measures also estab-lish price caps on some goods bought wholesale and sold privately, among them Cuban-produced soft drinks and beer, rum, cigarettes and chicken. State media said the meas-ures would go into effect on May 2.

Under economic reforms that began under President Raul Castro, Cuba has been slowly allowing private enterprise to compete with state-run businesses saddled by decades of inef-ficiency and lack of investment.

Private businesses have been dramatically outperforming gov-ernment-run enterprises but charge prices out of the reach of most

Cubans, leading to bitter complaints that the country’s socialist system no longer serves ordinary people.

Cuba imports most of its food and consumer goods but private and cooperatively run businesses have been unable to import through nor-mal channels, forcing them to depend on informal networks that arrange for Cuban airline passengers to bring hundreds of millions of dollars of good each year into the country in their checked bags.

Granting access to state-run importers could allow private busi-nesses to take advantage of new US regulations that allow American companies to export virtually any product to Cuba as long as its end user is a private business, worker-owned cooperative or ordinary consumer.

Emaar Properties says to split with India JV partner

Cuba opens wholesale market to some private businesses

Riyad Bank Q1 net profit flat from previous year The Peninsula

DOHA: As a partner of the International New York Times’ Luxury Conference 2016, Mall of Qatar established itself as a luxury and leisure destination that bridges the gap between East and West.

Held on April 5th & 6th at Waldorf Astoria-owned Hotel Tri-anon Palace in Versailles, France, the international conference “Luxury Beyond Product” brought together global luxury industry leaders that include Marco Biz-zarri, CEO of Gucci, Maureen Chiquet, former global CEO of Chanel, Richard Mille founder of the luxury watchmaker brand Richard Mille, John Demsey, Executive Group President, The Estee Lauder Companies and

Michael Kowalski, Chairman of the board, Tiffany & Co to name a few.

Rony Mourani, General Man-ager of Mall of Qatar, said luxury experiences are as important as luxury products: “It is essen-tial to share new ideas and fresh perspectives on emerging trends impacting the luxury industry, by partnering with luxury industry leaders Mall of Qatar validates the luxury and leisure experi-ences in the region.”

“Mall of Qatar by design is lux-urious and this filters through to each and every detail within the mall. After analysing that lux-ury shoppers maintained a strong association between shopping and leisure in a retail environment, our vision was to offer a luxurious entertainment destination that will host the world’s first live entertain-ment resident troupe in a mall that

will positively transform luxury and leisure experiences on offer in Qatar”, he added.

With extensive natural sky lighting across the vast space, Mall of Qatar will offer visitors a wide selection of major inter-national brands, over 100 food and beverage outlets and fine dining options, a 5-star luxury hotel - part of the Curio Collec-tion by Hilton - and an impressive array of unique entertainment experiences.

Now in its 15th year, this year’s conference was hosted and moderated by New York Times fashion director Vanessa Friedman. Attendees of the luxury confer-ence were also delighted to visit the Chateau de Versailles, where a prestigious gala dinner was held at La Gallerie des Batailles hosted by the jeweller and watchmaker Chopard.

Mall of Qatar partners with International NYT at the France Conference

A speaker at the International New York Times’ Luxury Conference 2016.

Equipment for rent

BUSINESS 25THURSDAY 14 APRIL 2016

IMF warns financial stability risks rising

Reuters

WASHINGTON: World financial markets have calmed after turmoil earlier this year, but more needs to be done to ensure global financial stability amid slowing growth, weak commodity prices and worries about China’s economy, the Inter-national Monetary Fund warned yesterday.

The IMF said in its latest Global Financial Stability Report that finan-cial system risks have risen since the last report in October and market turmoil could easily recur and inten-sify if no action is taken to clean up bank balance sheets, particularly in China and Europe.

“If the growth and inflation out-looks degrade further, the risk of a loss of confidence would rise. In such circumstances, recurrent bouts of financial volatility could interact with balance sheet vulnerabilities,” the IMF said in the report.

“Risk premiums could rise and financial conditions could tighten, creating a pernicious feedback loop of weak growth, low inflation and rising debt burdens,” it added.

Worries about China’s growth slowdown and transition to a more consumer-driven economy helped spark the most recent financial turmoil, and the IMF said China’s struggling state enterprise sector is straining bank balance sheets. The report estimates that bank loans to companies potentially at risk in China could translate into potential bank losses of approximately seven per-cent of the country’s gross domestic product.

“This may seem like a large number, but it is manageable given China’s bank and policy buffers and continued strong growth in the econ-omy,” said Jose Vinals, head of the IMF’s Monetary and Capital Markets Department.

The report complements the IMF’s gloomy World Economic Out-look publication released on Tuesday, in which the crisis lending institution cut its growth forecasts for the fourth time in the past year.

The report comes as finance ministers and central bankers from around the world convene in Wash-ington this week for the spring meetings of the IMF, the World Bank and Group of 20 finance ministers

and central bank governors. The for-mal meetings begin on Friday and continue through Sunday.

The IMF stability report said neg-ative interest rate policies, along with bond purchases, were “crucial” to boosting economic growth, mark-ing a sharp contrast with German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schae-uble’s criticism of the European Central Bank’s negative rates as caus-ing problems for German banks and depositors alike. Although they have reduced bank profit margins, the report said banks would ultimately benefit from stronger growth and the ability to cut non-deposit fund-ing costs.

However, should the IMF’s worst-case market disruption scenario occur, its modeling suggests that potential global output growth could be reduced by 3.7 percentage points over five years—effectively the loss of nearly a year’s worth of growth at current levels.

Conversely, the Fund argues in the report that actions to reduce liquidity risks, clean up non-per-forming loan problems left over from the last financial crisis in advanced economies and reduce vulnerabilities in emerging mar-ket banks could add 1.7 percentage points to annual baseline growth by 2018 — roughly half of this year’s estimated growth.

The report also made a case for bank consolidation, particularly in Europe. It argued that banks whose business models are no longer via-ble following the financial crisis hold some 15 percent of bank assets in advanced economies.

Reuters

SAN FRANCISCO: Amazon.com Inc rolled out a new Kindle e-reader yes-terday, its eighth and slimmest device in the series, with a charger that is built into its cover.

The Kindle Oasis, which at $289.99 will be the most expensive in the range, will be available for orders yesterday and start shipping on April

27. Since first launching the Kindle in 2007, Amazon has continued to roll out gadgets like its Fire tablets and most recently Echo, a line of voice activated speakers.

The Kindle has emerged as the most dominant e-reader in the mar-ket as Rakuten’s Kobo and Barnes and Noble’s Nook struggled to win customers.

Amazon hopes to attract readers to its high-end Kindle with its longer lasting battery and sleek design.

The company said the new Kin-dle comes with a dual battery system, meaning that attaching the device to its cover will start recharging it automatically.

The Kindle Oasis weighs 4.6 ounces and is 3.4 mm at its thinnest point. “It’s the most advanced Kin-dle we’ve ever built - thin and ultra lightweight, it gets out of the way so you can lose yourself in the author’s world,” Amazon founder and CEO Jeff Bezos said in a statement.

Reuters & Bloomberg

LONDON: A British vote to leave the European Union on June 23 would hurt the economy, an overwhelming majority of economists said in a Reu-ters poll, and could push the Bank of England to cut interest rates for the first time since the financial crisis.

Conversely, if the outcome was to remain a member of the EU, those saying there would be a net positive economic boost and those saying neu-tral were roughly split.

“Both the UK and Europe risk a fall into recession in the following quarters due to the increased uncer-tainty. One has to take into account that the UK is the second largest econ-omy in the EU so this is a big deal,” said Mikel Milhoj at Danske Bank.

Britain’s economy could be one of the fastest growing among devel-oped nations, expanding 1.9 percent this year and 2.1 percent next, the poll of economists based in the UK and across Europe found - but that would be under threat from Brexit, as leav-ing the EU is known.

“Recessionary in the short-term,”

said Philip Rush, UK economist at Nomura based in London, adding that “longer term effects (are) less clear-cut.”

BayernLB economist Manuel Andersch, based in Munich, was more emphatic: “Short-term disaster, long-term damage.”

Thirty-one of the 35 economists polled said the economic impact from Britain leaving the EU would be neg-ative and four said it would have no effect. None said a Brexit would be positive for the economy.

Roughly two-thirds of those who answered questions on Brexit were UK-based, but there were no differ-ences in answers provided based on geography.

The sample was the monthly panel of forecasters on the British economy, at banks, fund manage-ment companies and independent research firms, who quite often dis-agree with each other.

On Tuesday, the International Monetary Fund cut its 2016 growth forecast for Britain to 1.9 percent from 2.2 percent and said the country could deal a damaging blow to the fragile world economy if it votes to leave the EU. The findings of the latest poll were

nearly identical to a Reuters poll of mainly UK-based economists taken about two months ago that showed an overwhelming view remaining in the UK would be best for the economy.

If the vote does go in favour of the “In” campaign, Britain’s beaten-down pound would rally 4 percent against the dollar in the immediate aftermath, a separate Reuters poll of foreign exchange strategists found last week.

While opinion polls on the ref-erendum suggest the result could be very close, most have come margin-ally in favour of an

“In” win and betting firms are also pricing that in. One poll published on Tuesday, however, showed the Leave campaign three points ahead. After public opinion polls failed to predict a Conservative Party victory in Britain’s 2015 parliamentary election there is a great deal of uncertainty around their accuracy.

What’s more certain is inflation won’t reach the Bank of England’s 2 percent target anytime soon. The lat-est Reuters survey suggested it would be the second half of 2017 at least before it even gets close.

Low oil prices have meant most

central banks have struggled to get inflation to rise and the BoE won’t be lifting interest rates from a record low until early next year, a sepa-rate Reuters poll found earlier this month.

But a move from 0.5 percent, which would be the first change in over seven years, could also be swung by a Brexit vote. Seventeen of 26 economists in the poll said if Britain decides to leave the Bank’s next move would likely be a cut.

“If the UK votes to leave the EU, then the BoE is likely to cut inter-est rates to 0.25 percent, but also restart quantitative easing,” said Azad Zangana, London-based sen-ior economist at asset management firm Schroders.

Meanwhile, the pound rose for a third day, reaching the strongest level in more than a week versus the dol-lar and euro, after data showed UK inflation accelerated more than econ-omists forecast last month.

Sterling climbed against all but one of 16 major peers after the Office for National Statistics said annual inflation quickened to a 15-month high of 0.5 percent in March, from 0.3 percent the month before. The median

estimate in a Bloomberg survey of analysts was for an increase to 0.4 percent. While the measure is inching closer to the Bank of England’s tar-get of 2 percent, markets are still not pricing for policy makers to increase interest rates this year. Officials will announce their next policy decision in two days. A referendum on Britain’s membership to the European Union in June may be supporting the case for inaction.

“The potential reaction to this mild upward surprise should be lim-ited as UK data and their impact on the BOE reaction remain overshad-owed by the greater risks tied to the ‘Brexit’ referendum,” said Roberto Cobo Garcia, a strategist at Banco Bilbao Vizcaya Argentaria in Madrid. “Despite these figures, we continue to favor short positions in cable” before the June vote, he said, referring to a bet that Britain’s currency will decline against the dollar.

The pound climbed 0.7 percent to $1.4332 as of 11:28 a.m. London time, extending its gain over the past three days to 2 percent. Sterling advanced 0.6 percent to 79.66 pence per euro, leaving it more than 1.5 percent stronger since April 7.

Bloomberg

NEW YORK: Oil prices can climb above $50 a barrel if an output freeze deal is struck in Doha this weekend, according to Bank of America Corp.

“A flat output profile for OPEC (excluding Iran) and Russia would tighten global balances by almost 0.5 million barrels a day in the second half relative to our expec-tations and push the oil market into a deficit in the third quarter,” the US bank wrote in a note yester-day. That would “push prices above $50 near term,” it said.

At least 15 countries — including most members of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, as well as non-members such as Russia — have agreed to meet in the Qatari capital on the weekend. Brent crude, which sank to a 12-year low in January, has climbed about 30 percent since Saudi Arabia, Rus-sia, Qatar and Venezuela reached a preliminary agreement to freeze output on February 16.

Both a soft output freeze and a hard output freeze, with “some enforcement mechanism,” would boost prices to above $50 a bar-rel, Bank of America said. Brent traded at $44.20 as of 12:06 p.m. in London.

Whatever the outcome of the meeting, the market is rebalancing, partly due to a drop in US produc-tion and rising global demand, the bank said. US oil production stands at 9.01 million barrels a day, down 6.2 percent from the record high of 9.61 million reached in June last year, according to the US Department of Energy.

Bank of America didn’t exclude the possibility of a fail-ure to reach a freeze agreement, a scenario that would lead to prices dropping below $40 a bar-rel. One risk is that Saudi Arabia could announce an expansion in production in response to Iran’s return to the market following the end of the sanctions on its nuclear agreement in January. In that case, prices could fall as low as $30 a barrel, the bank said.

AFP

NEW YORK: US regulators rejected yesterday the bankruptcy contin-gency plans of five giant US banks that aim to avoid taxpayer bailouts if they fail.

Both the Federal Reserve and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation said the “living will” plans were “not credible” for Bank of America, Bank of New York Mel-lon, JPMorgan Chase, State Street and Wells Fargo.

The five “too big to fail” banks were given until October 1 to improve the plans, which were required in the Dodd-Frank reg-ulations governing systemically important banks in the wake of the devastating 2008 financial crisis.

Failure to pass the test could

result in higher capital require-ments and other toughened standards, such as restrictions on bank operations.

The regulators found that the living wills of two other large banks, Goldman Sachs and Mor-gan Stanley, also had weaknesses. They were ordered to address the deficiencies, but did not technically fail the test.

The FDIC found that Goldman’s plans “was not credible or would not facilitate and orderly resolu-tion under bankruptcy,” the FDIC said. The Federal Reserve came to that same conclusion about Mor-gan Stanley.

Regulators also found problems in Citigroup’s plan but “they did not believe the shortcomings rose to the level of the statutory required for a joint determination of non-credibil-ity,” the FDIC said.

Oil can top $50 a barrel with freeze deal: Bank of America

US rejects ‘living will’ plans of most large US banks

The Bank of America building in Los Angeles, California. Five out of eight of the biggest US banks do not have credible plans for winding down operations during a crisis without the help of public money, federal regulators said yesterday.

Poll: Brexit vote would damage UK economy

The IMF said in its latest Global Financial Stability Report that financial system risks have risen since the last report in October and market turmoil could easily recur and intensify if no action is taken to clean up bank balance sheets, particularly in China and Europe.

Slimmer Kindle e-reader launched

Visitors gathering at Amazon booth during the 2016 China International Electronic Commerce Expo in Yiwu, east China’s Zhejiang province. The expo has attracted 1,185 e-commerce companies from 12 countries including Canada, France and Germany.

Bloomberg

LONDON: Global equities erased losses for the year, while com-modities from copper to grains surged as an improvement in the outlook for China’s economy spurred a rally in risk assets. US stocks climbed to a four-month high as J P Morgan Chase & Co’s results topped estimates.

The Standard & Poor’s 500 Index headed for the biggest two-day rally since March 2, while Brazil’s Ibovespa hit a 10-month high, European shares rallied and Russia’s benchmark closed at the highest since 2008. Cop-per and iron ore jumped, and haven assets including the yen and gold retreated. The dollar rallied the most in three weeks after falling to

a nine-month low. Treasury 10-year notes gained for the first time in four days after a $20bn auction of the securities drew a lower-than-forecast yield.

After roiling financial markets in the first six weeks of the year, signs that the slowdown in the Chi-nese economy may not be as deep as some investors expected fueled a recovery in stocks from Asia to America. Speculation the oil mar-ket will soon find some enduring stability is also helping to prop up equities. J P Morgan’s surprise results helped mitigate some con-cern over what’s projected to be the worst US earnings season since the global financial crisis.

The MSCI All-Country World Index climbed 1.3 percent at 2:11pm in New York, pushing its gain since February 11 to 14 percent and eras-ing a slide in 2016 that reached 12

percent. The rebound comes after the gauge plunged into a bear mar-ket two months ago.

The S&P 500 rose 0.9 percent to the highest since December 4, adding to a 1 percent rally on Tuesday even as data showed showed retail sales and wholesale prices unexpectedly slumped last month.

J P Morgan jumped 4.6 percent after adjusted earnings per share of $1.41 beat the $1.25 average esti-mate of 29 analysts surveyed by Bloomberg, as it became the first of the big lenders to report this sea-son. Analysts project first-quarter profits at S&P 500 firms shrank 10 percent in the first quarter — including a 20 percent decline at banks — compared with earlier estimates that they will stagnate.

The Stoxx Europe 600 Index rose 2.5 percent, the most since March 11 for a fourth day of gains.

Commodity producers — one of the only industry groups up for the year — were among the biggest gain-ers. The FTSE 100 Index, rich in resource companies, turned pos-itive for the year.

The MSCI Asia Pacific Index jumped 1.9 percent to the highest close since January 1. The Hang Seng China Enterprises Index of mainland shares listed in Hong Kong jumped 4 percent. The MSCI Emerging Markets Index rose for a fifth day, climbing 1.2 percent. Rus-sia’s Micex Index rose 1.5 percent.

The Bloomberg Dollar Spot Index, which tracks the greenback versus 10 peers, rose 0.6 percent, after reaching a nine-month low on Tuesday. The US currency added 0.7 percent to $1.1311 per euro, its strongest in two weeks, and gained 0.6 percent to 109.17 yen.

Copper rose 1 percent to $4,816

a tonne, leading industrial met-als higher after China, the world’s biggest consumer, boosted foreign purchases to an all-time high. Alu-minum advanced 1.4 percent and nickel gained 1 percent. Iron ore closed 2.3 percent higher in China at 419 yuan a tonne, the highest since March 21.

Oil declined from a four-month peak amid speculation over the likely outcome of a meeting by major suppliers to discuss freez-ing output, while US industry data showed crude stockpiles expanded last week. West Texas Interme-diate fell 0.9 percent to $41.78 a barrel and Brent dropped 0.8 per-cent to $44.33.

Gold fell 0.8 percent to $1,245.35 an ounce, slipping from the high-est level in more than three weeks as investors assessed the timing of higher borrowing costs in the US.

BUSINESS26 THURSDAY 14 APRIL 2016

QE Index 10,245.87 0.00 %

QE Total Return Index 16,577.13 0.00 %

QE Al Rayan Islamic Index 4,046.84 0.25 %

QE All Share Index 2,860.68 0.01 %

QE All Share Banks & Financial Services 2,748.5 0.04 %

QE All Share Industrials 3,161.62 0.42 %

QE All Share Transportation 2,563.49 0.94 %

QE All Share Real Estate 2,544.54 0.06 %

QE All Share Insurance 4,567.87 0.03 %

QE All Share Telecoms 1,156.05 0.11 %

QE All Share Consumer Goods & Services 6,744.73 0.29 %

QE INDICES SUMMARY QATAR STOCK EXCHANGE

QE MARKET SUMMARY COMPARISON

GOLD AND SILVER

WORLD STOCK INDICES

13-04-2016 Today 12-04-2016 Previous dayIndex 10,245.87 10,246.29

Change 0.42 86.63

% 0.00 0.85

YTD% 1.76 1.76

Volume 10,770,773 18,734,527

Value (QAR) 438,806,971.85 496,605,285.14

Trades 5,910 7,382

Up 18 | Down 18 | Unchanged 03

GOLD QR145.8040 per grammeSILVER QR1.8846 per gramme

Index Day’s Close Pt Chg % Chg Year High Year LowAll Ordinaries 5127.194 73.539 1.46 5379.6 4762.1

Cac 40 Index/D 4456.56 110.65 2.55 4586.11 3892.46

Dj Indu Average 17721.25 164.84 0.94 18351.4 15370.3

Hang Seng Inde/D 21158.71 654.27 3.19 21794.84 18278.8

Iseq Overall/D 6268.59 95.43 1.55 6791.68 5611.89

Karachi 100 In/D 33646.1 29.2 0.09 34154.7 29785

Nikkei 225 Index 16381.22 452.43 2.84 18951.12 14865.77

S&P 500 Index/D 0 0 0 2134.72 1810.1

EXCHANGE RATECurrency Buying Selling

US$ QR 3.6305 QR 3.6500

UK QR 5.1520 QR 5.2250

Euro QR 4.0902 QR 4.1482

CA$ QR 2.8164 QR 2.8719

Swiss Fr QR 3.7583 QR 3.8114

Yen QR 0.0330 QR 0.0336

Aus$ QR 2.7613 QR 2.8167

Ind Re QR 0.0542 QR 0.0552

Pak Re QR 0.0345 QR 0.0351

Peso QR 0.0783 QR 0.0798

SL Re QR 0.0246 QR 0.0253

Taka QR 0.0460 QR 0.0470

Nep Re QR 0.0339 QR 0.0345

SA Rand QR 0.2455 QR 0.2504

Reuters

DUBAI: Middle Eastern stock markets rose yesterday, encouraged by an overnight jump in oil prices which boosted Saudi Arabian petrochemical shares in partic-ular, and strength in Asian bourses after strong Chinese trade data.

The Saudi index climbed 0.6 percent in the heav-iest volume for three weeks. In the petrochemical sector, Sipchem jumped 5.5 percent. Yansab, which was due to release first-quarter earnings after the close, gained 3.5 percent. NCB rose 0.7 percent. It posted a 1 percent rise in profit to SR2.63bn ($702m).

Saudi British Bank surged 4.9 percent after posting a 2.4 percent rise in profit to SR1.14bn. But Bank Aljazira fell 2.1 percent after reporting a 68 percent year-on-year rise in quarterly profit.

Dubai’s index added 0.8 percent to 3,501 points as heavyweight Emaar Properties gained 2.7 percent. The index is technically bullish after closing above its 200-day average on Tuesday for the first time since August.

Bourse operator Dubai Financial Market surged 5.5 percent to 1.53 dirhams in its heaviest volume since October as it broke technical resistance on its March peak of 1.47 dirhams.

But Union Properties, the most heavily traded stock, fell 1.3 percent after saying its board had approved increasing its capital to Dh7bn ($1.9bn); it did not say how capital would be boosted.

Abu Dhabi rose 1.1 percent largely because of First Gulf Bank, which jumped 3.3 percent. Egypt’s index gained 1.2 percent in modest volume. Global Telecom climbed 3.1 percent; Russia’s Interfax news agency quoted a presentation for an upcoming eurobond issue by its parent VimpelCom as saying VimpelCom would use the proceeds of the issue to pay off a shareholder loan to Global Telecom.

HIGHLIGHTSSAUDI ARABIA: The index rose 0.6 percent to 6,442

points.EGYPT: The index climbed 1.2 percent to 7,421 points.DUBAI: The index rose 0.8 percent to 3,501 points.ABU DHABI: The index gained 1.1 percent to 4,455 points.QATAR: The index was flat at 10,246 points.KUWAIT: The index rose 0.6 percent to 5,306 points.OMAN: The index edged up 0.04 percent to 5,731 points.BAHRAIN: The index edged up 0.1 percent to

1,123 points.

Most Gulf stock markets rise

INTERNATIONAL MARKETS - A LIST OF SHARES FROM THE WORLD

A C C-A/D 1469.9 23.15 21273

Aarti Drugs-B/D 464.4 0.4 2018

Aban Offs-A/D 187.8 3.85 360206

Ador Welding-B/D 301.6 19 4315

Aegis Logis-B/D 110.55 -0.4 133296

Alembic-B/D 37.7 -0.1 71814

Alok Indus-A/D 4.8 0.01 1154391

Apollo Tyre-A/D 169.45 1.05 184188

Asahi I Glass-/D 167 4.85 17232

Ashok Leyland-/D 110.3 -1.25 1725447

Bajaj Hold-A/D 1490.85 33.85 1721

Ballarpur In-B/D 16.7 -0.12 194443

Bata India-A/D 542.3 7.75 41167

Bayer Crop-A/D 3833.25 72.8 1070

Beml Ltd-A/D 940.85 36.1 103262

Bh Electronic-/D 1190.65 5.25 36168

Bhansali Eng-T/D 19.65 0.4 80351

Bharat Bijle-B/D 946.75 -6.25 5603

Bharatgears-B/D 72.95 1.8 3686

Bhartiya Int-B/D 458 -11 5831

Bhel-A/D 133.35 6.2 1816714

Bom.Burmah-B/D 410.05 17.95 51261

Bombay Dyeing-/D 48 0.2 176635

Camph.& All-B/D 576.5 14.5 3673

Canfin Homes-B/D 1309.75 93.15 14607

Caprihans-Xc/D 90 5.5 17552

Castrol India-/D 380.45 -1.85 61386

Century Enka-B/D 188.6 1.7 17720

Century Text-A/D 613.85 5.3 184743

Chambal Fert-B/D 60.55 0.45 88831

Chola Invest-A/D 790 -0.65 128375

Chowgule St-T/D 17.6 0.15 10752

Cimmco-B/D 73.2 -0.65 3603

Cipla-A/D 511.75 8.75 198192

City Union Bk-/D 97.6 2.1 21044

Colgate-A/D 835 13.8 35923

Container Cor-/D 1268.1 0.75 12673

Dai-Tichi Kar-/D 408 -7.6 2926

Dcm Financia-T/D 0.77 0.03 2500

Dcm Shram Ind-/D 123.7 -2.2 4846

Dhampur Sugar-/D 87.6 0.4 145383

Dr. Reddy-A/D 3100.6 17.8 40541

E I H-B/D 107.5 -2.65 39169

E.I.D Parry-A/D 230 2.45 90783

Eicher Motor-A/D 19896.85 368 3344

Electrosteel-B/D 18.6 0.2 207764

Emco-B/D 27.2 0 19556

Escorts Fin-B/D 4.18 0 54683

Escorts-A/D 168.35 -1.1 373981

Eveready Indu-/D 259.8 10.65 17881

F D C-B/D 186.6 -0.2 4640

Federal Bank-A/D 44.65 0.55 347187

Ferro Alloys-B/D 5.15 0.15 18126

Finolex-A/D 370 7.75 10682

Gail-A/D 367.6 1.05 221857

Galada Power-B/D 14 -0.46 2100

Gammon India-T/D 12.75 0 130090

Garden P -B/D 23.25 -0.45 6919

Godfrey Phil-B/D 1225.25 19.85 39445

Goodricke-B/D 184.9 0.8 26281

Goodyear I -B/D 521.1 11.1 11104

Hcl Infosys-B/D 46.25 -0.2 406216

Him.Fut.Comm-T/D 18.65 -0.25 1480711

Himat Seide-B/D 193.5 3.25 29819

Hind Motors-T/D 5.33 0.19 203480

Hind Org Chem-/D 16.05 -0.1 7953

Hind Unilever-/D 895.5 24.8 113133

Hind.Petrol-A/D 849.85 16.25 80822

Hindalco-A/D 96.3 4.4 2198704

Hous Dev Fin-A/D 1113.2 23.6 105943

I F C I-A/D 24.8 0.6 2420028

Idbi-A/D 69.95 0.45 685107

India Cement-A/D 93.2 0.05 369263

India Glycol-B/D 89.4 -0.75 9350

Indian Hotel-A/D 105.25 1.85 89053

Indo-Tcount-T/D 999.9 1.05 7405

Indusind-A/D 988.2 19.2 96191

J.B.Chemical-B/D 248.6 -0.6 5316

Jagatjit Ind-X/D 83.9 0 67196

Jagson Phar-B/D 36.2 1 24753

Jamnaauto-B/D 147.8 0.6 64183

Jbf Indu-B/D 206.9 0.5 11056

Jct Ltd-B/D 4.66 -0.05 821771

Jenson&Nich.-B/D 8.27 0.03 12141

Jktyre&Ind-A/D 85.55 1.1 476390

Jmc Projects-T/D 225.1 4.3 112172

Kabra Extr-B/D 94.55 5.9 11261

Kajaria Cer-A/D 991 25.25 11050

Kakatiya Cem-B/D 296.8 14.1 144368

Kalpat Power-B/D 211.6 0.45 9061

Kalyani Stel-T/D 167.1 0.3 39379

Kanoria Chem-B/D 68.85 -0.15 30212

Kg Denim-B/D 91.4 -1.6 22804

Kilburnengg-Xd/D 59.85 -1.3 27559

Kinetic Eng-B/D 91.95 8.35 27574

Kopran-B/D 52.3 -0.1 48252

Lakshmi Elec-B/D 370.2 2.5 3324

Lgb Broth-B/D 478.2 9.2 1356

Lloyd Metal-B/D 32.4 -0.45 74363

Lok.Hous&Con-B/D 5.02 0.03 23896

Lupin-A/D 1543.85 8.15 87924

Lyka Labs-T/D 87.65 -0.5 69728

Mah.Seamless-B/D 206.2 26.2 134490

Maha Scooter-B/D 1270 43 1641

Mangalam Cem-B/D 240.4 0.1 6360

Mastek-B/D 150.7 -1.1 47147

Max Financial-/D 353 1.9 20349

Mrpl-A/D 67.05 2.85 246936

Nahar Spg.-B/D 101.75 -0.15 23921

Nation Alum -A/D 41.2 2 361590

Navneet Edu-B/D 88.15 5.7 71543

Nepc India-T/D 1.58 0.03 13625

O N G C-A/D 213 2.7 367780

Oil Country-B/D 25.65 1 56719

Onward Tech-B/D 75 0.4 1985

Orchid Pharm-B/D 41.85 -0.1 69003

Orient Hotel-T/D 22.7 0.6 7951

Orient.Carb.-T/D 486.25 2 1627

Oudh Sugar-B/D 73.45 -2.6 70776

Patspin India-/D 8.88 0.26 4425

Punjab Chem.-B/D 172.5 8.5 11514

Radico Khait-B/D 87.9 0.2 38669

Rallis India-A/D 189.95 7 97759

Rallis India-A/D 189.95 7 97759

Reliance Indus/D 437.1 -6.3 127451

Ruchi Soya-B/D 29.65 -0.1 31822

S Bk Bikaner-B/D 505 4.8 3549

Salora Inter-B/D 47.5 3.5 10911

Saur.Cem-B/D 67.1 1.1 133976

Sterling Tool-/D 483 5 4627

Tanfac Indust-/D 28 -0.25 1825

Tanfac Indust-/D 28 -0.25 1825

Thirumalai-B/D 212.8 0 7358

Til Ltd.-T/D 396.1 -8.1 17950

Timexgroup-T/D 31.8 -0.2 39314

Tinplate-B/D 71 -0.75 38409

Ultramarine-B/D 120.9 1.7 14134

Unitech P -A/D 5.09 0.07 7651387

Univcable-B/D 80.8 2.8 73505

Uppergsugar-T/D 125.2 -5.8 46847

3I Group/D 473.9 14.2 585479

Assoc.Br.Foods/D 3351 33 146659

Barclays/D 163.35 7.7 27007601

Bp/D 365.1 8.15 18663291

Brit Am Tobacc/D 4190.5 23 755330

Bt Group/D 446.4 2.05 4930749

Centrica/D 236.7 1.6 5219914

Gkn/D 290.3 5.3 2474097

Hsbc Holdings/D 443.6 23.5 16718383

Kingfisher/D 373.9 0.6 1747086

Land Secs Grou/D 1139 18 600630

Legal & Genera/D 245.41 7.6 9226596

Lloyds Bnk Grp/D 69.18 2.55 73993154

Marks & Sp./D 446.2 8.5 2361781

Next/D 5400 25 287250

Pearson/D 827.5 -7.5 1332313

Prudential/D 1403.5 58.5 2651185

Rank Group/D 246.6 0.6 103621

Rentokil Initi/D 177.5 -0.5 420457

Rolls Royce Pl/D 668.5 11 1537746

Rsa Insrance G/D 478.9 5.9 773206

Sainsbury(J)/D 287.2 1.4 4857806

Schroders/D 2556 16 222608

Severn Trent/D 2238 -5 111699

Smith&Nephew/D 1173 7 415200

Smiths Group/D 1112 13 192117

Standrd Chart /D 515.8 45.1 11661391

Tate & Lyle/D 585.5 0.5 176848

Tesco/D 185.5 -10.8 45131441

Unilever/D 3256 16.5 1268046

United Util Gr/D 958.185 -2 334730

Vodafone Group/D 227.15 0.6 12953029

Whitbread/D 3764 23 219867

COMPANY CLOSE NET VOLUME

NAME CHG TRADED

COMPANY CLOSE NET VOLUME

NAME CHG TRADED

COMPANY CLOSE NET VOLUME

NAME CHG TRADED

COMPANY CLOSE NET VOLUME

NAME CHG TRADED

LONDON

Global stocks erase 2016 losses on China data

BUSINESS VIEWS 27THURSDAY 14 APRIL 2016

Investors wonder if Ukrainian privatisation will ever materialiseBy Alessandra Prentice

Reuters

Foreign investors are waiting impatiently for a new Ukrainian government to kick-start privatisation. They are far

from sure it will.Parliament is expected to vote on a

cabinet line-up this week following Prime Minister Arseniy Yatseniuk’s resignation on Sunday after months of political infighting in a country already destabilised by pro-Rus-sian separatism.

Lawmakers said technocrat Finance Min-ister Natalia Yaresko was likely to be dropped; Economy Minister Aivaras Abromavicious, a key driver for privatisation, had already resigned over what he said was meddling by vested interests.

The pro-Western authorities who came to power in 2014 after a Moscow-backed pres-ident fled protests against his rule pledged to sell off state firms they said were crippled by graft.

But a privatisation plan the government predicted would raise $778m for the budget

last year involved sales of just $7m, according to data from the State Property Fund.

Brian Best, a managing director at Dragon Capital, the largest investment bank in Ukraine and minority owned by Goldman Sachs, said potential buyers might soon walk away.

Investors are “definitely in a wait-and-see mode, but they won’t wait forever. They have capital to deploy and that capital will seek markets that are easier to invest in than Ukraine if something isn’t done in the near future,” Best said.

He cites the example of Dragon Capi-tal’s involvement as advisor to a Western consortium interested in buying Ukraine’s second-largest thermal energy company Centrenergo.

The sale has been repeatedly pushed back: from end-2015, to the end of the first quarter of 2016 and beyond. The consortium lost patience and gave up on the purchase last year, Best said, declining to name the com-panies involved.

Best said energy ministry representatives had discussed “highly inflated” prices in pri-vate meetings with the consortium and also

suggested “privatisation wasn’t going to hap-pen - that they weren’t going to do it.

But then the prime minister said they were going to do it, so it was mixed signals, mixed negative signals,” he said.

A spokeswoman for the Energy Ministry disputed that account, saying the ministry had always supported privatisation and none of the meetings between ministry represent-atives and investors had reflected a different attitude.

“The consistent position of the ministry has been maximum cooperation on the sale to create competitive conditions on the ther-mal generation market,” she said in emailed comments.

The ministry also referred Reuters to Energy Minister Volodymyr Demchyshyn’s expressed commitment to the sale of Cen-trenergo, which the State Property Fund has indicated may be ready by the end of November.

Andrew Favorov, managing partner of energy project development firm Energy Resources of Ukraine (ERU), says it took a year of visits to Europe and the United States to persuade investment funds to consider

Centrenergo and the delays were putting them off.

“What is in doubt is whether this invest-ment, these funds, will be around for much longer. They’re saying - ‘where’s something tangible?’ Nobody believes the press confer-ences, people have a hard time taking the words at face value anymore. We’re yet to get a clear picture,” Favorov told Reuters.

He said ERU hoped to invest $200m-$300m over the next 2-3 years: “this is what we do - we buy beat-up old Soviet assets and whip them into shape, but the dis-connect between the public statements on privatisation and the actual tangible steps is apparent and pronounced. That’s why we’re acutely following what’s going on.”

The biggest 100 of Ukraine’s over 3,000 state companies posted a combined loss of 117bn hryvnia ($4.6bn) in 2014, an economy ministry report said.

Centrenergo, which runs three power plants built in the 1960’s-70’s, posted a 60 percent year-on-year fall in earnings that year. A government report last September said it topped the near-term privatisation list due to its “urgent funding needs”.

By John Kemp

Reuters

Fuel consumption is not very sensitive to a small change in prices in the short run, but

if the price change is large enough and lasts long enough the amount used can change significantly.

The 60 percent decline in oil prices over the last two years has now been large enough and lasted long enough that it is start-ing to have a significant impact on the medium-term outlook for oil demand.

Most crude oil is used as a transportation fuel in aircraft, ships, trains, trucks and cars, which is where the biggest impact of lower prices on consumption is being felt (“Essentials of petro-leum”, Frankel, 1946).

Between 2004 and 2014, the apparently relentless surge in oil prices resulted in a sharp focus on improving fuel efficiency.

Container ships and oil tank-ers switched to slower speeds to reduce fuel consumption, a prac-tice known in the industry as

“slow steaming”.Fuel consumption rises with

the third power of speed so even a relatively modest reduction in speed results in a big saving on fuel. Slower speeds result in longer journey times and need more ships to move the same vol-ume of freight but shipping lines were prepared to absorb higher capital costs in order to save on the running cost of fuel. Even airlines instructed aircraft to fly slightly slower to save on fuel.

More importantly, airlines cut weight and fuel consumption by reducing the amount of unneces-sary fuel, water and other items carried on board.

In another economy meas-ure, airlines reduced ultra-long non-stop routes, which force air-craft to carry more fuel on board (fuel weight is a substantial source of energy consumption). And on land, trucking firms and logistics operators focused on optimising route networks to save on fuel bills while consumers opted for smaller and more fuel-efficient vehicles.

The entire transportation sys-tem became significantly more efficient, which is a major rea-son fuel consumption consistently declined in the advanced econ-omies between 2005 and 2014. But now the cost of fuel has fallen sharply and seems set to remain low for the next several years, the focus has shifted from fuel efficiency to speed, power and convenience.

The impact remains patchy

and hard to quantify, but there are plenty of signs that cheaper fuel prices are reversing or at least blunting the former trend towards increased fuel efficiency.

Fuel economy standards in the United States are improving the fuel efficiency of both cars and light trucks such as crosso-ver utility vehicles.

However, the fuel economy regulations specify separate standards for cars and light trucks (stricter standards for cars and more generous ones for trucks).

Consumers have responded to the drop in prices by opting to buy more trucks and fewer cars, lowering the economy-wide fuel savings compared with the origi-nal projections. The fuel economy regulations assumed consumer vehicle purchases would split roughly 60:40 between cars and trucks by 2016 but instead the split is almost 40:60.

As a result, the fuel economy standards are on track to deliver only half to two-thirds of the anticipated reduction in fuel con-sumption (“Low gas prices expose flaw in US fuel economy stand-ards”, Forbes, April 11).

The relaxation of fuel econ-omy is evident in the air where airlines have been adding more ultra-long flights and seat utilisa-tion has edged down (“Long-haul flights get longer”, Wall Street Journal, April 10).

Cheap fuel is also helping stimulate a surge in delivery serv-ices and has made possible the focus on super-fast home deliver-ies being pioneered by Amazon’s Prime service.

Delivery services are the fast-est growing part of the freight network at the moment and expected to provide most of the demand growth over the next decade (“DOT releases 30-year freight projections”, BT, March 3).

Amazon is investing heav-ily in building up its own air freight capacity to meet surging demand for deliveries within 24 to 48 hours (“Amazon’s airfreight moves raises hopes in cargo busi-ness”, Wall Street Journal, April 7).

The emphasis within the entire transport system is shifting from minimising (fuel) cost to max-imising speed and convenience. Trucking companies are increasing competing to offer faster delivery service to customers willing to pay a premium (“Trucking company’s new sales pitch: speed”, Wall Street Journal, April 11).

The emphasis on speed at the expense of efficiency is even evi-dent in the growth of rail services between Asia and Europe seek-ing to win volume from maritime routes (“China-Europe con-tainerised rail shipments gain momentum”, Journal of Com-merce, 2015).

Cheap oil is blunting drive for fuel efficiency

China’s steel glut: Years in the making but years to resolve

By David Stanway

Reuters

China is facing increasing interna-tional pressure to tackle a steel supply glut that has flooded glo-bal markets and left beleaguered overseas producers at risk of

closure. China produces half the world’s steel but those hoping it will tackle its sur-plus capacity quickly will be disappointed, despite rhetoric from Beijing.

A steel production glut that has taken years in the making, will equally take years to resolve. The economy is growing at its slowest pace in 25 years and labour unrest is on the rise, a worry for the ruling Com-munist Party that fears the social unrest that millions of laid off steel workers could bring.

“Closures can not be completed overnight,” said a person with ties to China’s leadership. “Sta-bility is the top priority.”

China’s fading eco-nomic growth has exposed the huge sur-plus capacity in steel making, leaving many producers with heavy losses that are adding to already high debts. Many see the solution in exports, which rose to a record in 2015, a major factor dragging global prices down to decade lows.

India’s Tata Steel has blamed a flood of cheap steel imports, includ-ing from China, for a

decision to pull out of Britain, putting 15,000 jobs at risk. On Monday, more than 40,000 German steel workers took to the streets to protest against dumping from China, among other issues such as industry consolidation that they fear will cost them their jobs.

Hillary Clinton, widely expected to be the Democrat candidate in US presiden-tial elections this year, added her voice to the criticism, saying on Monday she would

“impose consequences when China breaks the rules by dumping its cheap products in our markets.”

Official data shows China’s production capacity is just over 1.1 billion tonnes a year although analysts estimate another 100 mil-lion tonnes are produced illegally.

Underlining the scale of problem fac-ing Beijing, official figures suggest surplus capacity is some 300-400 million tonnes a year and exports in 2015 reached a record 110 million tonnes - about 10 times the annual steel output of Britain.

Although the China Iron and Steel Asso-ciation and some steel executives have predicted that exports will fall in 2016, Chi-nese customs data on Wednesday showed shipments soared 30 percent in March from the same month a year ago.

Much of China’s production glut was sparked by the country’s debt-fuelled stim-ulus in 2009, when a government-directed 4 trillion yuan ($625 billion) was injected into the economy to ward off the global finan-cial crisis.

The stimulus drove up steel demand by as much as 100 million tonnes in 2009 and encouraged producers to embark on a rapid capacity expansion using cheap credit.

“The steel mills were delighted - they didn’t need to die, breathed a sigh of relief and also relaxed their vigilance towards overcapacity,” said Liu Zhenjiang, the vice secretary-general of the CISA. “Those years

China’s fading economic growth has exposed the huge surplus capacity in steel making, leaving many producers with heavy losses that are adding to already high debts.

But a privatisation plan the government predicted would raise $778m for the budget last year involved sales of just $7m, according to data from the State Property Fund.

created ingrained bad habits when it came to overcapacity.”

China raised hope of a solution in Feb-ruary when it pledged to shut 100-150 million tonnes of old production capac-ity in five years, but actual production is expected to stay high as Beijing tries to minimise job losses and social disruption.

New plants have continued to come on line, and CISA has warned that capacity would increase further this year.

“The government is understandably very nervous about how exactly they’re going to do this,” said Geoffrey Crothall, communications director at China Labour Bulletin. “I think eventually pressure will build and they will have to go ahead. But you really shouldn’t expect it to happen overnight.”

CISA’s Liu said existing mills are doing little to curb supply, noting they were trapped in a “vicious circle” in which they ramp up production at the first sign of price improvements.

Many firms engage in “hostile com-petition”, raising production and slashing prices in a bid to outlast rivals, he said.

Government policy initiatives have not always helped either. One target to consolidate 60 percent of capacity in the hands of the 10 biggest steel enterprises helped spur a fevered round of expansions at mid-sized mills desperate to avoid being swallowed up.

Premier Li Keqiang reiterated on Mon-day Beijing intended to quicken steps to tackle the surplus production.

But the central government faces strong resistance from many local gov-ernments. Dozens of “zombie” mills cling to life thanks to the support of local gov-ernments terrified by the prospect of mass unemployment and carrying the steel firms’ spiralling debts.

An employee unloads steel products at a market in Yichang, Hubei Province, China.

BUSINESS28 THURSDAY 14 APRIL 2016

When will Goldman Sachs hit elusive debt-trade jackpot?By Lisa Abramowicz

and Rani Molla Bloomberg

GOLDMAN Sachs is patiently waiting for a time when debt trad-ing becomes more

profitable again. But it’s unclear when and if the perfect fixed-income conditions will ever arrive, or what they’ll look like.

The New York bank keeps reiterating its commitment to fixed income despite the unit’s steadily declining revenue and new regulations that crimp potential debt profits. Its top exec-utives noted that “cycles do turn, even if the timing of such inflec-tions may be difficult to predict,” according to their annual letter to shareholders. The bankers are perhaps are being defensive ahead of the banks’ first-quarter earnings report on April 19, which probably won’t be great in large part because of debt-trading rev-enue that could be as much as 59 percent lower according to some analyst forecasts.

Here’s the paradox: Gold-man Sachs is doing quite well in debt according to a number of different measures. It’s winning a bigger share of the US fixed-income business, which is the biggest and historically most lucrative market, according to investor surveys by Greenwich Associates. It has made par-ticular inroads in the nation’s interest-rates and government bonds market, where it is now the leader, the surveys show.

Next, take a look at the bond-underwriting business, which is separate from trading

but related. Banks that manage more bond sales are also typ-ically involved in more of the trading around newly issued notes. And yields on riskier debt have risen. That all sounds pretty good. So why was the start of this year probably such a bummer for Goldman?

Here are some ideas of what could’ve been better:

1) Benchmark rates could be higher. After more than seven years of ultra-low-rate poli-cies, developed-market yields around the world are near all-time lows and investors are growing accustomed to central-bank intervention. This has led to low profit margins for traders.

2) Many firms, including Goldman, are hoping that smaller competitors die out or shrink, leaving them with an even big-ger market share. This is already happening to some extent.

3) Banks could be on the winning side of this volatility for a change, positioning their books perfectly without incur-ring too much risk. But this balance is getting more diffi-cult to achieve as banks have a smaller hand to play with under new regulations.

Maybe Goldman will surprise everyone with bet-ter-than-expected revenues, just as JPMorgan did. Or maybe there’s no other choice but for Goldman executives to say they’re devoted to maintaining a robust debt business even as the firm’s peers predict lower over-all fixed-income profits in the years to come. They’ve already gone down this path. They have to seem committed to it, even if they’re thinking about quietly backing away.

FIXED INCOME

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#Emaar’s new retail center may be bigger than #DubaiMall

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Stock prices are mov-ing because people are tweeting out-of-date stories

#USA: high-yield bonds default rate could triple to 6-8% by 2017 – #energy sector most at risk.

Opec sees bigger drop in

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it forecast non-OPEC output

would fall by 700,000

barrels a day this year. It is

now estimating that drop

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day.

Pulling money out of

individual retirement

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retirement.

BACK TO BUSINESSsight

By Sue-Lin Wong

and Adam Jourdan Reuters

CHINA’S hopes that con-sumer spending can become its new growth engine have taken a few dents in 2016, but a new generation of over-

spenders might give the economy a shot in the arm, even as they stretch their own resources to breaking point.

A young, middle-class and tech-savvy cohort dubbed the ‘moonlight generation’ — because their banks accounts are light at the end of the month — are turning their backs on the cautious ways of their hard-sav-ing parents and embracing credit.

That is welcome news to Beijing policymakers, who last month urged lenders to open the taps for shoppers after economic growth slipped to its slowest pace in 25 years, retailers reported signs of stress and bloated industries prepared for a wave of redundancies.

It’s also good news for Simon Loong, founder and chief executive of online lending platform WeLab, which he said has 3.2 million users in China. “The consumption behaviour of millennials is quite different; they more are looking for instant gratifica-tion,” he said, adding that longer-term financial planning took a back seat.

Policymakers are trying to deepen the level of access to credit similar to what took place in the United States 100 years ago, said China-focused investment strategist Andy Rothman, referring to a US credit-driven con-sumption boom in the 1900s.

“These things are great, but need to be done in a careful and deliberate way, because we’ve seen in the U.S. if you don’t do that then these things can be abused and create problems.”

China’s ‘moonlight’ generation puts tomorrow’s growth on credit

Relative to income levels, house-hold debt has already reached nearly 60 percent, up from 35 percent in 2007, according to the Institute of International Finance.

Tian Xue, 27, who works at a state-owned firm in Shanghai and considers herself part of the moon-light demographic, can see problems building up for some of her peers. “I think a lot of people end up spending more than they can really afford, just without thinking about it,” she said.

Tian, who lives with her parents, keeps her money online in digital “wallets”, which typically have sister platforms offering credit. She said she often spends around 20-30,000 yuan ($3,100-4,600) in a month, well above

her income of around 6,000 yuan.A widening array of funding

options are available to young shop-pers like Tian — traditional credit cards, peer-to-peer loans and credit platforms offered by e-commerce companies such as Alibaba Group Holding Ltd and JD.com Inc. “When I use (Alibaba’s) Taobao, it just pops up, telling me that I can pay with Ant Check Later,” said Pang Yu, a 25-year-old railway ticket inspector in Beijing.

She uses the Alibaba-linked plat-form, which allows shoppers to pay for purchases the following month, along with her credit cards, to run up sometimes as much as 20,000 yuan a month in debt, more than she and her partner earn. Alibaba declined to

comment for this story, while JD.com said it used big data to target con-sumers who have the ability to repay money quickly.

The Chinese still spend and bor-row only about half the levels of US consumers relative to GDP, and the most recent World Bank figures show it is still the world’s third-most pro-lific nation of savers, but things are changing fast.

Consumer borrowing hit nearly 20 trillion yuan in February, a three-fold rise since 2010, and household debt relative to the economy has dou-bled since 2008 to nearly 40 percent.

Such rapid growth in a system where regulation is lax might pose risks that credit quality will suffer. Officials have already vowed to crack down on unregulated lending into the property market, for example, which is raising household debt and the risk of a property bubble.

The China Banking Regulatory Commission, which is responsible for financial regulation, did not return requests for comment on potential risks. The levels of consumer debt still pale in comparison with total debt in the economy, which hit 250 percent of GDP in 2015, dominated by gov-ernment and corporate debt.

Economists say China’s high sav-ings rate — around 46 percent of GDP last year, according to the central bank governor — acts as a natural buffer to systemic shocks from con-sumer credit. Which is an indirect way of saying that the moonlight gen-eration’s long-suffering parents will probably bail them out when things go wrong, as they did for 26-year-old Ms Gong, a car saleswoman in Beijing.

She couldn’t pay back the 20,000 yuan she ran up on plastic last year to fund what she called “a necessary expenditure” — cosmetic surgery on her nose - so mum and dad stepped in. She has no regrets. “It was all worth it, and I look great.”

Pang Yu, a 25-year-old railway ticket inspector in Beijing, shows her phone operating Ant Check, an Alibaba-linked platform, at a cafe in Beijing, China.

Khan to ride on fear factor at Alvarez showdown

PAGE | 33 PAGE | 35

Hamilton looks for more

Shanghai success

THURSDAY 14 APRIL 2016 • 7 Rajab 1437

www.thepeninsulaqatar.com

@peninsulaqatar @peninsula_qatarthepeninsulaqatar

Sealine Rally: Qatar’s Abdullah aims for second successive winThe Peninsula

DOHA: Nissans dominate the entry list for the Sealine Cross-Country Rally, round three of the FIA World Cup for Cross-Country Rallies, which takes place across the State of Qatar from April 17 to 22.

The Japanese manufacturer will be represented by a staggering 15 Nissan Patrol derivatives – one third of the entire 45-car entry – for the

gruelling five-day off-road challenge that passes over some of the wildest and most demanding terrain in the country.

Adel Hussein Abdullah returned to Qatar in triumphant mood last week-end after clinching victory in the T2 category for Series Production Cross-Country Vehicles at the Abu Dhabi Desert Challenge.

Adel and Egyptian navigator Hakam Mohamed Rabeia delivered a superb performance in their Nis-san Patrol to finish 13th overall, the

success belying the Qatari’s lack of experience in rallying as a car driver – he normally races quads or works as a navigator in special stage rallies.

“Last weekend was superb for us and now it’s time to repeat that win with the Nissan on home ground,” said Adel Hussein, who also has the early lead in the FIA T2 championship standings after two rounds.

Running with support from Nis-san Middle East and Al Masaood Automobiles, Abu Dhabi-based Leb-anese Emil Khneisser will be hoping for better luck on this occasion with Russian navigator Alexei Kuzmich. Khneisser was running inside the top three at the start of the event in Abu Dhabi last week, but a niggling engine sensor issue cost him valua-ble time and crucial championship points. Khneisser finished second in last year’s T2 Championship and knows that a podium finish is needed in Qatar next week.

The T2 category is well supported in Qatar. Among those quite capable of springing a surprise are the Saudi Arabian trio of Ahmed Al Shegawi, Rajeh Al Shammeri and Tariq Al Ram-mah, Qatar’s Mohammed Al Rashid and Kuwait’s Salem Al Dhafiri. Ger-many’s Edith Weiss teams up with the experienced American navigator Ron Gainley to round off the Nissan

T2 entrants. Saudi Arabia’s Khalid Al Feraihi earned a superb 10th overall at last weekend’s Abu Dhabi Desert Challenge in his T1 Nissan Patrol with Omani navigator Abdulhaleem Al Busaidi. He is quite capable of push-ing for the top 10 in Qatar as well, although the difficulty of the navi-gation will put far more pressure on his co-driver on this occasion.

Other T1 Nissan entrants include Sheikh Hamed bid Eid Al Thani, the 1993 FIA Middle East rally champion, former Ha’il Rally winner Ibrahim Al-Muhanna and three all-female prize drive pairings entered in a joint ven-ture between the Qatar Motor and Motorcycle Federation (QMMF) and FIA Women in Motorsport.

The French duo of Charlotte

Berton and Antonia de Roissard crew the first of three Nissan Patrols. Kiwi Emma Gilmour teams up with Lisette Bakker in the second car and Spain’s Cristina Gutierrez lines up with South Africa’s Sandra Labuscagne in the third Nissan.

The event gets underway from the Losail International Circuit on April 18.

Battle for second place hots up in QSL

The Peninsula

DOHA: Jesualdo Ferreira’s Al Sadd will be hoping to finish the 2015-16 campaign on a high by securing the second spot in the Qatar Stars League (QSL) standings but for that to happen, the Doha giants must beat El Jaish in the final round later this week.

Al Sadd, who have posted three wins against one draw in their last four matches, take on El Jaish - one of the most consistent sides in QSL - with aims of finishing the season behind champions Al Rayyan.

Second-placed El Jaish, coached by Sabri Lamouchi, have 47 points from 25 matches, whereas, Al Sadd - who finished second last season - are in third spot with a tally of 46 points.

A draw won’t help Al Sadd but El

Jaish know they must not lose tomor-row at Qatar Sports Club Stadium.

Ferreira said Al Sadd is aiming for the win tomorrow.

“The match is for the second posi-tion in the league. Our target is for the second position and El Jaish are also aiming for that. But we will seek the win no matter what.”

Ferreira’s men may face El Jaish in the upcoming Qatar Cup but the coach insists they will be different games altogether.

“The game will be preparation for the Qatar cup. Each game is a differ-ent situation this in the league and that’s in the cup.” He also added that, “I think El Jaish will play with their best players because they will want to win both games.”

“We had some big mistakes in the last match and we will work on our defense in the next game,” added the Portuguese tactician.

Pedro Miguel and Morteza Poura-liganji are doubtful for the next game,

“Pedro got injured in the last game and Morteza Pouraliganji as well. Both players are very impor-tant for me and when they came to Al Sadd they improved the

defensive line a lot,” added the sixty-nine-year-old.

El Jaish are currently in second place but only one-point clear of their third placed rivals. They will want to win the match in order to secure sec-ond position at the end of the season.

Sabri Lamouchi, the head coach of the Soldiers is keen on getting the three points in the last game of the season.

“This game is the last game of the league. If we don’t lose we will be in second place. Al Sadd we know is the biggest club in Qatar, big his-tory and big support. We will go into this match hoping to win.”

“For us the season is not finished. Our target was to qualify for AFC Champions League and get second place. We have two more cups after this, so for us our season starts now,” said the Frenchman at the press con-ference on Wednesday.

Apart from the team’s targets El Jaish also have a top contender for the golden boot in Abdelrazzak Hamdallah.

“The club wants to help Ham-dallah get the golden boot. When he plays around the box he is a killer and has 20 goals this season. And if he gets the golden boot it will be good for him and good for the team as he will have more confidence to score,” added Lamouchi.

Qatar’s Adel Hussein celebrates last week’s T2 win in his Nissan Patrol. He will be hoping to repeat that feat at next week’s Sealine Rally.

Al Kharaitiyat need victory to avoid the dropThe Peninsula

DOHA: Al Kharaitiyat will need a win against Umm Salal at Al Khor Stadium tomorrow if they are to avoid relega-tion from Qatar Stars League.

Kharaitiyat are twelfth and dan-gerously close to the drop zone as they

are only one-point clear of Qatar SC.A win against Umm Salal will

confirm the Thunders will stay in the Qatar Stars League next season.

Amar Osim (pictured), coach of Kharaitiyat, is hoping that his team can step up and rise for the challenge, “We hope we are ready for this chal-lenge. We are working on it and we know that there is no possibility to

repair things after this last game.” “The good thing about the game is that we know exactly what we need. If we want to decide our situation this time we know that if we win we are ok. In this context the situation is clearer,” added the Bosnian tactician.

Speaking about the upcoming match Umm Salal, Osim added, “I don’t think this is an easier match.

I hope it is. Umm Salal will want to go up in the table and for sure they will not go down. They are a serious team and they have played very well all season long.”

Kharaitiyat defeated Al Wakrah last week but Osim believes that Umm Salal is much stronger opposition.

“Umm Salal is a very difficult team even more than Al Wakrah.

Umm Salal is 5th and Al Wakrah is 11th so to be 5th is a big achievement in this league.”

Kharatiyat’s position could be affected by the result of other matches but their coach is not concerned about that, “I don’t want to talk about the other games I just want to focus on our match. We are all motivated to win,” added the 48-year-old.

Al Sadd need a win while El Jaish require just a draw to finish second in the Qatar Stars League

QSL LAST ROUND ACTION ON FRIDAY AND SATURDAY

Sabri Lamouchi (left), coach of El Jaish and midfielder Sardor Rashidov pose for a picture after a press conference in Doha yesterday.

Qatar Stars League Fixtures

Round 26 ( last round matches)

April 15Al Kharaitiyat vs Umm Salal,

6.15pm Al Khor Club

Lekhwiya vs Mesaimeer,

6.15pm Lekhwiya Club

Al Sadd vs El Jaish,

6.15pm Qatar Sports Club

Al Wakrah vs Qatar SC,

6.15pm Al Wakrah Stadium

Al Gharafa vs Al Khor, 6.15pm,

Al Ahli Stadium

April 16Al Arabi vs Al Sailiya, 6.15pm,

Al Ahli Stadium

Al Ahli vs Al Rayyan, 8.30pm, Al

Gharafa Stadium

QSL Standings P W L D GF GA PtsAl Rayyan 25 20 3 2 67 20 62

El Jaish 25 14 6 5 46 27 47

Al Sadd 25 13 5 7 52 36 46

Lekhwiya 25 13 10 2 58 40 41

Umm Salal 25 9 5 11 36 32 38

Al Arabi 25 10 10 5 32 35 35

Al Ahli 25 9 9 7 39 38 34

Al Gharafa 25 9 9 7 33 36 34

AlSailiya 25 10 12 3 38 45 33

Al Khor 25 8 11 6 24 31 30

Al Wakrah 25 9 14 2 33 44 29

Al Kharaitiyat 25 7 12 6 36 44 27

Qatar S.C 25 6 11 8 30 50 26

Mesaimeer 25 1 21 3 14 60 6

2016 Sealine Cross-Country Rally – Nissan entries208. Khalid Al-Feraihi (SAU)/Abdulhaleem Al-Busaidi (OMN) Nissan Patrol

212. Ibrahim Al-Muhanna (SAU)/Osama Al-Sanad (SAU) Nissan Patrol

214. Hamed Al-Thani (QAT)/TBA Nissan Patrol

217. Adel Hussein Abdullah (QAT)/Hakam Mohamed Rabeia (EGY) Nissan Patrol (T2)

219. Emil Khneisser (LEB)/Alexei Kuzmich (RUS) Nissan Patrol (T2)

221. Ahmed Al-Shegawi (SAU)/Arif Yousef Mohammed (ARE) Nissan Patrol (T2)

223. Mohammed Al-Rashid (QAT)/TBA Nissan Patrol (T2)

231. Ahmed Al-Shegawi (SAU)/Waleed Al-Fouam (SAU) Nissan Patrol

239. Tariq Al-Rammah (SAU)/Turki Al-Rammah (SAU) Nissan Patrol (T2)

240. Rajeh Al-Shammeri (SAU)/TBA Nissan Patrol (T2)

242. Salem Al-Dhafiri (KWT)/Fares Al-Thafiri (KWT) Nissan Patrol (T2)

243. Edith Weiss (DEU)/Ron Gainley (USA) Nissan Patrol (T2)

244. Charlotte Berton (FRA)/Antonia de Roissard (FRA) Nissan Patrol

245. Emma Gilmour (NZL)/Lisette Bakker (AHO) Nissan Patrol

246. Cristina Gutierrez (ESP)/Sandra Labuscagne (RSA) Nissan Patrol

SPORT30 THURSDAY 14 APRIL 2016

Ronaldo fires Real Madrid into semis

AFP

MADRID: Cristiano Ronaldo inspired Real Madrid to a record sixth succes-sive Champions League semi-final with a hat-trick as the Spanish giants overturned a 2-0 first leg deficit, beating Wolfsburg 3-0 on Tuesday.

Ronaldo struck twice in just over a minute to bring Madrid level in the tie inside 17 minutes.

Yet, the 10-time winners were forced to wait until 13 minutes from time to find the winner when Ron-aldo’s dipping free-kick escaped the clutches of Diego Benaglio to find the bottom corner.

“Cristiano deserved a magic night,” said Madrid captain Sergio Ramos.

“We need him, he gives every-thing for the shirt. For a long time he has shown he is the number one and when he is on form you notice.”

Madrid coach Zinedine Zidane hailed his side’s collective effort, but reserved special praise for Ronaldo who became the first player to score three hat-tricks in the competition in one season.

“He is showing what he is, which is the best player in the world,” said the Frenchman.

“Cristiano needs the whole team, I want to speak about the team because they achieved this together.

“But he is special because not everyone is capable of scoring three goals.”

Wolfsburg boss Dieter Hecking was left to rue his side’s inability to defend from set-pieces and lack of a killer away goal.

“We should have defended better. To go to the next stage, we needed a goal,” he said.

“Two of the three goals were from dead balls and so that tells you that we didn’t defend right.”

Madrid hadn’t overturned a first-leg deficit in the Champions League in eight attempts stretching back 14 years to when Zidane played for Los Blancos in a quarter-final win over Bayern Munich.

However, they roared back into the tie and were level as Ronaldo struck twice in 86 seconds.

Dani Carvajal replaced the much-criticised Danilo in Madrid’s only change from the first leg at right-back and the Spanish international’s deflected cross fell perfectly for Ron-aldo to tap home the opener at the back post.

The two nearly combined for the second straight from the restart as another dangerous Carvajal effort was just cut out before Ronaldo could head home.

However, there was no stopping the three-time World Player of the Year from the resulting corner as his downward header found the bottom corner of the net.

Wolfsburg’s disastrous start was compounded when star midfielder Julian Draxler limped off injured to be replaced by Max Kruse just after the half-hour mark.

Yet, the Germans still managed to grow into the game as the opening 45 minutes wore on.

Luis Gustavo’s fierce long-range effort forced Keylor Navas into a decent save before Bruno Henrique squandered a huge chance to net the vital away goal as he hesitated in get-ting his shot off and Marcelo got back to block the ball behind.

Madrid started on the front foot

again at the start of the second half as Ronaldo saw a free-kick deflected wide before Benaglio was forced into a save to prevent Josuha Guilavogui turning a cross into his own net.

The hosts were convinced they had gone ahead for the first time in the tie when Ramos’s header came off the inside of the post and rolled along the goal line, but Hungarian referee Viktor Kassai adjudged the ball hadn’t crossed the line.

Ronaldo finally struck the deci-sive blow when his free-kick from 25 yards skidded off the wet turf and beyond the despairing dive of

Benaglio to seal his 37th hat-trick for Madrid and 16th Champions League goal of the season.

The 31-year-old is now just one away from equalling his single-sea-son record of 17 goals in 2013/14.

The Swiss ‘keeper then kept Wolfsburg in the tie with brilliant saves from Karim Benzema and Jese Rodriguez to set up a grandstand finish.

But Madrid’s experience told in the dying stages as they comfortably saw the game out to match Barce-lona’s record run of six semi-finals between 2008 and 2013.

Portuguese striker

silences big game

critics in victory

over Wolfsburg

AFP

MADRID: “Goals are in my DNA,” concluded Cristiano Ronaldo after spearheading a famous Real Madrid comeback with a hat-trick to see off Wolfs-burg and reach the Champions League semi-finals for a record sixth straight season.

The three-time World Player of the Year’s self-appraisals are rarely humble.

It is just six weeks since he called out his teammates for not matching his standards in a 1-0 defeat to local rivals Atletico Madrid.

Yet, it was hard to argue with Ronaldo’s logic as he snapped back at critics that his barrel load of goals haven’t come when Real have needed them most.

On the night coach Zined-ine Zidane’s admitted Madrid’s season was “on the line”, Ronal-do’s treble overturned a 2-0 first leg deficit in a 3-0 win over the Germans.

“Considering this has been a bad season for me it has not been that bad,” he added after taking his tally for the season in all competitions to 46.

“People can criticise me, but I just keep on going and the num-bers are there for all to see.”

The numbers are indeed spectacular. Ronaldo has now scored at least 45 goals in his last six seasons for Madrid.

Three more against Wolfs-burg on Tuesday made him the first player ever to score three hat-tricks in the same Champi-ons League season.

And he is now just one goal away from matching his own record of 17 in a Champions League season when Madrid ended a 12-year wait to win their 10th European Cup two years ago.

There was no holding back in the Madrid press’ displays of affection for Ronaldo on yester-day’s front pages.

“How great you are,” ran sports daily Marca.

Meanwhile, AS led with “how am I not going to love you,” alongside a picture of Ronaldo celebrating his third.

“Little-by-little you are val-uing me,” Ronaldo responded when asked why despite 359 goals in just 342 games to streak ahead as the top scorer in Madrid’s history, he still isn’t uni-versally loved in a season where he has even been whistled by his own fans.

“I am used to criticism. In Spain it is like this and it doesn’t affect me.

“I am still young, but these things don’t affect me at 31.”

Having moved the wrong side of 30 there has been plenty of speculation that Madrid may consider cashing in on their big-gest asset before his valuation plummets towards the end of his contract in 2018.

Yet, for those still in need of reminding, Ronaldo left another indelible night for his legacy with a new first as Madrid overturned a first leg deficit in the Champi-ons League for the first time in 12 years.

“Cristiano deserved a magic night,” said Madrid captain Ser-gio Ramos.

“He showed what he is, which is the best player in the world,” added Zidane.

The debate over whether Ronaldo or Barcelona rival Lionel Messi deserves the title of the world’s best has raged for a decade.

But despite his critics, and the presence of Gareth Bale and Karim Benzema, Ronaldo left no doubt he remains Madrid’s number one and will be badly missed once he is gone.

Spanish giants overturn first-leg 2-0 deficit to qualify for the last four stage of the Champions League

Portuguese defender Pepe celebrates the goal of team-mate Cristiano Ronaldo during the Champions League quarter-final second leg match against Wolfsburg at the Santiago Bernabeu Stadium in Madrid on April 12.

Zidane passes biggest test yetReal Madrid’s Portuguese striker Cristiano Ronaldo (right) chats with his coach, French Zinedine Zidane during the UEFA Champions League quarter-final second leg match against Wolfsburg played at Santiago Bernabeu Stadium in Madrid, Spain on Tuesday.

Reuters

MADRID: Zinedine Zidane overcame the biggest challenge of his fledg-ling coaching career as Real Madrid brushed aside VfL Wolfsburg to over-turn a first-leg deficit and reach the Champions League semi-finals.

Last week’s surprise 2-0 defeat at Wolfsburg left the Frenchman fac-ing the prospect of becoming the first Madrid coach since Manuel Pellegrini in 2010 to fail to reach the last four of the competition.

Tuesday’s hat-trick from a resurgent Cristiano Ronaldo at the Bernabeu saved him from that fate.

“I’ve lived football as a player, I know what it is like. I am now living it as a coach, which is much more dif-ficult,” admitted Zidane after the 3-2 aggregate win.

“I can’t worry about what might happen. We have to be calm when this (losing a first leg) happens; you can’t

go mad because all sorts of things happen in football.”

Zidane attracted criticism for starting Danilo rather than Dani Carvajal in the first leg in Ger-many and for his decision to take off Luka Modric, saying: “I had to do something”.

In the second leg, Zidane rein-stated the Spaniard at right back and the decision had an instant impact, with Carvajal showing desire to beat Julian Draxler to the ball in midfield and then setting up Ronaldo’s opener.

“We are a team and I always have to make decisions, we all win together but it’s true that Carvajal was enor-mous today,” said Zidane.

The Frenchman vowed not to get ahead of himself after the win, which was the first time Madrid had overturned a first-leg deficit in the Champions League since 2002 when a team containing Zidane saw off Bayern Munich in the quarter-finals on their way to lifting the trophy.

“I never got a big head as a player

and it won’t happen as a coach either after a night like this, I know how dif-ficult this job is,” said Zidane, who has repeatedly talked about the expec-tations on a Madrid manager since succeeding Rafa Benitez in January.

The coach did not shy away from suggestions that Ronaldo had saved his reputation, and possi-bly his job.

“He is the best player in the world and nights like tonight make him a special player,” said Zidane. “He makes the difference.”

Meanwhile, Aston Villa have decided to scrap their player of the season awards for the 2015/16 campaign, with the club on the cusp of relegation from the Pre-mier League.

The Birmingham club, bottom of the table and 15 points adrift of safety, will be relegated on Saturday if Nor-wich avoid defeat against Sunderland or if they themselves lose at Manches-ter United. Villa, currently without a manager, have won just three league

games out of 33 this season and a club spokesman said yesterday:

“The club will not be holding its annual Player of the Year Awards at the conclusion of this season. In the current circumstances, we are sure our supporters will understand.”

Villa have lost their last eight games and former manager Remi Garde left last month, with Eric Black currently in caretaker charge.

Last weekend’s 2-1 loss at home to Bournemouth sent Villa to the brink of dropping down into the second-tier Championship. Villa, whose US-based owner Randy Lerner has been trying to sell the club, have been ever-present in the Premier League since its creation in 1992 and the former European champions were last rele-gated from the top flight in 1987.

Former Manchester United boss David Moyes, Nigel Pearson, previ-ously with Leicester, and Garry Monk, who was at Swansea, have all been linked with the managerial vacancy at Villa Park.

Italy add Finland

to pre-Euro 2016

friendly menu

AFP

MILAN: Italy will play Finland in a last-minute friendly before this summer’s Euro 2016, the Italian football federation (FIGC) announced yesterday.

Italy, trounced 4-0 by Spain the final four years ago, travel to France this summer looking for big improvements after limping out of the 2014 World Cup at the first round for the second succes-sive edition.

The Azzurri, led by future Chelsea manager Antonio Conte, recently held 2010 world cham-pions Spain to a 1-1 draw in Udine only to suffer a 4-1 thumping at the hands of current world champions Germany in Munich four days later.

Italy, who will face Belgium, the Republic of Ireland and Swe-den in Group E, will face Scotland in a friendly in Malta on May 29.

Two days later, on May 31, Conte will confirm his 23-man Euro 2016 squad to European foot-ball’s ruling body UEFA.

A week before their open-ing match of Euro 2016, away to Belgium in Lyon, Italy will host Finland at the Marcantonio Ben-tegodi stadium.

The return to the venue, the home of Serie A club Verona, comes 27 years after Italy were held 1-1 by Uruguay in an April, 1989 friendly.

In previous games against Fin-land, Italy have come out largely on top, claiming 10 wins, one draw and losing just once, although that defeat came at the 1912 Olympic Games.

Champions LeagueResults

Paris: Champions League quarter-

final, second leg results on Tuesday:

At Manchester, England

Man City (ENG) 1 (De Bruyne 76) Paris

Saint-Germain (FRA) 0

Man City win 3-2 on aggregate

At Madrid

Real Madrid (ESP) 3 (Ronaldo 16, 17,

77) Wolfsburg (GER) 0

Real Madrid win 3-2 on aggregate

SPORT 31THURSDAY 14 APRIL 2016

De Bruyne sinks PSG as Man City reach last four

AFP

MANCHESTER: Manchester City reached the Champions League semi-finals for the first time after Kevin De Bruyne’s fine 76th-minute goal earned them a 1-0 win over Paris Saint-Ger-main on Tuesday.

A week on from their 2-2 draw in the French capital, City saw Sergio Aguero squander a first-half penalty after he had been felled by PSG goal-keeper Kevin Trapp, but De Bruyne’s late strike settled the Etihad Stadium nerves and completed a 3-2 aggregate success.

Fifteen points off the pace in the Premier League and widely consid-ered the tie’s underdogs, City advance with hope intact that manager Manuel Pellegrini may yet bow out with a Champions League winner’s medal around his neck before handing over to Pep Guardiola.

“It’s a very great achievement for the club, not only to be in the best four teams of Europe, but also in the style of play that we never change,” said Pellegrini.

But it was a bitterly disappointing evening for PSG coach Laurent Blanc, who lost Thiago Motta to injury and has now seen his team eliminated in the quarter-finals four seasons in a row.

The French champions’ ambitious Qatari owners must once again content themselves with the pursuit of another domestic quadruple, while Zlatan Ibra-himovic, whose contract expires at the end of the season, may never grace the continental stage in their colours again.

“If we analyse the two matches, in our strong moments we weren’t clinical

enough,” said Blanc.The burst of sky-blue tickertape

that greeted the teams as they entered the pitch illustrated the importance of the occasion to both clubs, while PSG’s shape at kick-off confirmed pre-match reports that they would be set out in an untested 3-4-1-2 system.

With Angel di Maria operating in a free role, PSG had plenty of options in midfield and they made an assured start, City goalkeeper Joe Hart forced to make a finger-tip save from a zing-ing Ibrahimovic free-kick.

But as City began to probe, so they exposed fissures in PSG’s new-look defence and after Aguero had twice shot wide, a loose pass from auxiliary right-sided centre-back Serge Aurier allowed Fernandinho to set Aguero clear.

Sliding out, Trapp felled the Argen-tina striker with his feet, but the presence of two covering defenders meant that he was only booked and from the penalty, Aguero placed the ball a foot wide of the right-hand post.

With Blaise Matuidi suspended and Marco Verratti injured, it left PSG with-out their entire first-choice midfield and Blanc promptly rejigged, sending on Lucas Moura and reverting to his trusted 4-3-3.

Although City, gamely, continued to push in search of a goal that would have given them an outright lead, PSG began to knock on the door at the other end.

Hart had to parry another stinging Ibrahimovic free-kick and then clubbed the ball over his crossbar after Thiago Silva’s header from a Lucas corner spat up off the turf towards him.

The introduction of Javier Pastore for the hapless Aurier, on the hour, left PSG with their full attacking armada on show, but it was De Bruyne who stole the headlines, brilliantly shaping a right-foot shot into the bottom-right corner from outside the box to crush PSG’s spirit.

City’s fans had to endure a cou-ple more nervous moments, with Hart rushing out superbly to save from Edinson Cavani and Ibrahimovic see-ing a goal ruled out for offside, before the final whistle rubber-stamped their club’s arrival in the European big-time.

Manchester City’s Belgian midfielder Kevin De Bruyne celebrates after scoring during the UEFA Champions league quarter-final second leg match against Paris Saint-Germain at the Etihad Stadium in Manchester on Tuesday.

Midfielder scores the winner after Aguero misses penalty as City progress 3-2 on aggregate

Zlatan Ibrahimovic of Paris Saint Germain reacts after the UEFA Champions League quarter-final, second leg match against Manchester City in Manchester, on Tuesday.

Defeat could spell end of

road for Ibra generation

AFP

PARIS: Defeat by Manchester City in the Champions League could mean the exit of Zlatan Ibrahimovic and his exalted generation at Paris Saint-Germain.

Qatar Sports Investments have spent heavily at the French club to win the Champions League. Under Laurent Blanc they have won four straight French titles but now have become the first team to lose in four straight Champions League quar-ter finals.

“We are very disappointed with the result,” said a visibly drained Paris President Nasser Al Khelaifi (pictured) in a warning after the 1-0 defeat at Manchester on Tuesday which saw a 3-2 aggregate defeat.

“It’s the fourth time we reach the quarter-finals and are eliminated. Now we have to take a step back and analyse what has happened.”

Ibrahimovic, 34, is out of con-tract at the end of the season. The Swedish superstar, who has never won a Champions League, has already been linked to a move to the English Premier League.

Al Khelaifi said last month he wants Ibrahimovic to stay. But a summer rebuilding exercise could prove a game changer. Brazilian defender Maxwell is also 34 and with no deal after June.

Brazilian-born Italian Thiago Motto is 33 and also coming to the end of his contract, like Dutch right back Gregory van der Wiel.

Paris have the means and the desire to sign a new superstar, with Barcelona’s Brazilian scorer Ney-mar apparently on their wish-list. Al Khelaifi will surely be tempted to add new faces while keeping the likes of Angel di Maria, Thiago Silva and Marco Verratti.

The other question mark sur-rounds Blanc, who has a contract until 2018 but has the Champions League failures hanging over his record. “The future? We have a sea-son to finish. We have a French Cup semi-final to try to win and a League Cup final to win,” Blanc said.

“I know that doesn’t have the same flavour, the same excitement as the Champions League but we owe it to ourselves to win them for the club.

“We are very disappointed but we will have to get over it.”

Blanc was in the firing line after abandoning his usual 4-3-3 for-mation to play with three central defenders for the first half against City.

It was a gamble that backfired and one that followed a disappoint-ing performance in the first leg at the Parc des Princes.

“What a fiasco” screamed the front page headline on sports daily L’Equipe as the search for someone to blame began.

Former French international David Ginola said on BT Sport tele-vision that Paris were “lazy” against Manchester City and he doubted whether Blanc would still be in charge for the 2016-17 season.

Blanc said: “City are a very, very good team and we need to congrat-ulate them, but I think we can be disappointed because we could and should have done better.”

“In the first half we played with a new system and what happened, happened,” said Ibrahimovic who saw City goalkeeper Joe Hart bril-liantly save two of his free kicks.

“If it had gone well, nobody would say anything, and now people will say we gave it away. The second half was better, when we reverted to our normal tactics, but we gave away two games.”

From a French viewpoint, the Paris performance leaves a sense of deja vu.

Twelve times in the last 13 sea-sons a French side has appeared in the Champions League quarter-finals, and only twice have they gone further. One was Monaco in 2004 while the other was Lyon, semi-finalists in 2010.

Hart hails ‘amazing night’ for Man City AFP

MANCHESTER: Manchester City goalkeeper Joe Hart said that his team’s European toils had paid off after they beat Paris Saint-Germain 1-0 on Tuesday to reach the Cham-pions League semi-finals.

Eliminated in the last 16 in the previous two seasons, and in the group phase in the two campaigns prior to that, City completed a 3-2 aggregate victory over much-fancied French champions PSG thanks to a fantastic 76th-minute strike from Kevin De Bruyne.

City will now take their place in the last four for the first time in the club’s history and Hart believes that their performances against PSG

prove that they deserve to be there.“An amazing night for us,” Hart

told BT Sport at the Etihad Stadium. “We have worked hard in this com-petition. We struggled to start with, but we have started to compete.

“Credit to PSG, I thought they made it a fantastic encounter. I thought we really did shine in this leg. It was fantastic from the whole team, even those not on the bench,” he said.

With Sergio Aguero miss-ing a first-half penalty, City’s fans endured a night of nerves until De Bruyne delivered the killer blow with a curling shot from outside the pen-alty area.

“It feels great. We played a very good game. PSG didn’t create a lot and I think we deserved to go through,” he added.

Sevilla’s Spanish goalkeeper David Soria (right) takes part in a training session on the eve of the UEFA Europa League quarter-finals second leg match against Athletic Club Bilbao at the Cartaya’s municipal Stadium in Huelva, yesterday.

Sevilla prepare for Europa League clash

Leicester City’s trio on PFA shortlist AFP

LONDON: Leicester City’s extraor-dinary rise to the top of the Premier League has been recognised with the inclusion of three Foxes stars -- Jamie Vardy, Riyad Mahrez and N’Golo Kante -- on the shortlist for the Professional Footballers’ Associa-tion Players’ Player of the Year award next week.

The Leicester trio make up 50 percent of a six-strong panel that also includes Tottenham Hotspur’s

22-goal striker Harry Kane, West Ham’s France star Dimitri Payet and Arsenal midfielder Mesut Ozil.

They are all in the running to suc-ceed 2015 winner Eden Hazard, in an award which is voted for by their peers.

Kane is also a candidate to retain the Young Player of the Year award he won last year, with Spurs team-mate Dele Alli, Everton’s Romelu Lukaku and Ross Barkley, Stoke’s Jack Butland and Liverpool’s Philippe Coutinho also vying for the coveted award.

Vardy is just one goal behind

Kane in the race to be the Premier League’s top-scorer the ongoing season, while Algeria’s Mahrez has scored 16 goals, as well as provid-ing 11 assists.

Meanwhile Kante, recently capped by France, has won plaudits for his role as a defensive midfielder.

Payet has also had an impressive first season in the English Premier League, while Germany’s Ozil has shone for Arsenal in what threatens to be a disappointing season for the Gunners.

The award winners will be announced on Sunday, April 24.

Aston Villa scrap player awards AFP

LONDON: Aston Villa have decided to scrap their player of the season awards for the 2015/16 campaign, with the club on the cusp of relegation from the Pre-mier League.

The Birmingham club, bottom of the table and 15 points adrift of safety, will be relegated on Satur-day if Norwich avoid defeat against Sunderland or if they themselves lose at Manchester United.

Villa, currently without a man-ager, have won just three league games out of 33 this season and a club spokesman said Wednesday: “The club will not be holding its annual Player-of-the-Year Awards at the conclusion of this season. In the current circumstances, we are sure our supporters will understand.”

Villa have lost their last eight games and former manager Remi Garde left last month, with Eric Black currently in caretaker charge. Last weekend’s 2-1 loss at home to Bournemouth sent Villa to the brink of dropping down into the second-tier Championship.

Villa, whose US-based owner Randy Lerner has been trying to sell the club, have been ever-present in the Premier League since its creation in 1992 and the former European champions were last relegated from the top flight in 1987.

Former Manchester United boss David Moyes, Nigel Pearson, previously with Leicester, and Garry Monk, who was at Swan-sea, have all been linked with the managerial vacancy at Villa Park.

SPORT32 THURSDAY 14 APRIL 2016

Wada makes meldonium U-turn, could affect SharapovaReuters

MOSCOW: Athletes who tested pos-itive for meldonium before March 1 could have their bans overturned less than four months before the Rio de Janeiro Olympics after Wada said it was unable to establish how quickly the drug, outlawed since January 1, cleared the system.

The World Anti-Doping Agency’s notice to national anti-doping bod-ies is expected to have a major impact on many of the 172 athletes who have tested positive for the performance-boosting drug since January.

They include five-times Grand Slam tennis champion Maria Shara-pova, who was among 40 Russian athletes to test positive for the drug after it was added to Wada’s list of banned substances in January.

Sharapova’s lawyer John Haggerty accused Wada yesterday of “poorly” handling the issue and said they were now “trying to make up for it”. Wada

said there was “currently a lack of clear scientific information on excre-tion times”.

“As a result it is difficult to know whether an athlete may have taken the substance before or after Janu-ary 1, when it became illegal.

“In these circumstances, Wada considers that there may be grounds for no fault or negligence on the part of the athlete,” it said in a state-ment sent to anti-doping agencies and sports federations, adding that the presence of less than one micro-gram of meldonium in the samples was acceptable.

The anti-doping body’s notice also gave hope to athletes who have tested positive for the drug since March 1, depending on studies being carried out to determine how long it stays in the body.

Sharapova, who said she had been taking meldonium for more than a decade because of health problems, was provisionally suspended by the International Tennis Federation (ITF) in March after announcing she had

failed a test at the Australian Open.“The fact that Wada felt compelled

to issue this unusual statement now

is proof of how poorly they handled issues relating to meldonium in 2015,” Haggerty said in a statement.

“Given the fact that scores of ath-letes have tested positive for taking what previously was a legal product, it’s clear Wada did not handle this properly last year and they’re trying to make up for it now.”

Russian Tennis Federation Pres-ident Shamil Tarpishchev said Sharapova’s ban could be addressed in a meeting with ITF head David Haggerty later this month.

“The situation with Sharapova could be resolved after April 21 when we meet with the head of the inter-national federation. It is too early to talk about Sharapova competing at the Olympic Games,” Russia’s TASS news agency quoted Tarpishchev as saying.

Russian Sports Minister Vitaly Mutko welcomed Wada’s decision.

“The Russian Sports Ministry supports and welcomes the deci-sion made by Wada because it has shown a willingness to understand the situation, rather than stick to the rulebook,” Mutko said in a statement.

“Wada has demonstrated

impartiality and being objective in the fight against doping.”

Alexei Kravtsov, president of the Russian Skating Union (RSU), said that five-times world champion Pavel Kulizhnikov and 2014 Olympic short track gold medallist Semen Elistratov -- both found to have taken meldo-nium -- should be allowed to compete again after the Wada decision.

“These sportsmen should be allowed to fall under the amnesty due to the amount found in their doping tests,” Kravtsov was quoted as saying by the R-Sport news agency.

Two more Russian federations -- rugby and cycling -- said their ath-letes who had tested positive could be free to return to competition.

They include rugby player Alyona Mikhaltsova and cyclists Anastasia Chulkova and Pavel Yakushevsky who all tested positive for less than one microgram.

Meldonium, manufactured for people suffering from heart prob-lems, can also increase blood flow and improve exercise capacity.

Maria Sharapova reacts as she addresses the media regarding a failed drug test at the LA Hotel Downtown in this March 7, 2016 file photo.

Vesely stuns Djokovic as Nadal, Wawrinka cruise

AFP

MONTE CARLO, Principality of Monaco: Novak Djokovic lost only his second match of the season as he fell to Czech Jiri Vesely 6-4, 2-6, 6-4 to exit the Monte Carlo Masters yes-terday.

“This is a proof that nobody’s unbeatable. It happens so many times in my career that I lose a match. It’s not a first time,” Djokovic said.

“It’s not easy to lose the match and accept it right after exiting the court.

“But I have to congratulate my opponent. I think he played very solid.

“He was serving very big. He was playing tactically good and aggressive.

“There are a very few things I could take out from today’s match as a positive -- I was playing really, really bad.”

The second round loss in just over two hours, Djokovic’s opening match of the tournament, nonetheless left the Serbian with an impressive 28-2 win-loss record in 2016.

He was also beaten when he had to quit a Dubai quarter-final two months ago with an eye infection.

The reigning champion had not lost in 22 Masters 1000 matches since going down in the 2015 Cincinnati final and had won his last 14 matches on the ATP circuit heading into this week.

He last went out in an opening match two years ago in Madrid when he was beaten in the second round by Grigor Dimitrov.

“It’s disappointing to lose the first match playing at home in a way,” Djokovic said.

“I practise here in these courts.“I’ve lived here for the last eight,

nine years. It’s definitely not some-thing that I wished and not something that I wanted. But in sport you’ve got to accept it.

“Time off will serve me well -- mentally mostly. It’s been a tough four or five months. I need time to kind of recharge.”

Vesely was stunned by his first success in nine attempts against a top 10 player.

“I fought for every point,” said the Czech.

Djokovic saved a match point in the final game but it was not enough as Vesely earned two more and con-verted on the first of those when the seed fired wide.

Stan Wawrinka and Rafael Nadal both booked spots in the third round with the pair starting their spring sea-sons in contrasting form to Djokovic.

French Open champion Wawrinka began perhaps the most important clay seasons of his career with a 7-6 (7/2) 7-5 defeat of Philipp Kohlschreiber.

Nadal, the fifth-seeded Roland Garros king, emerged a 6-3, 6-3 win-ner over Briton Aljaz Bedene. Nadal will next play Austrian 12th seed Dominic Thiem, who beat him in a February clay semi-final in Buenos Aires. Thiem advanced in Monte Carlo over Japan’s Taro Daniel 4-6, 6-2, 6-0.

“I’m happy for the victory, but I

know I have to improve for tomor-row. But I have confidence because I have been practising very well these weeks,” Nadal said.

“Let’s see if I am able to play the way that I was practising.

“Tomorrow is going to be a tough match against a difficult opponent.”

Fourth seed Wawrinka, who won

the Monaco title in 2014, will line up in the third round against 15th seed Gilles Simon. “He’s a really tough player,” Wawrinka said of the French-man. “It’s going to be a good test for me to see where is my level.”

Bosnian Damir Dzumhur, ranked 99 in the world, pulled off an upset over sixth seed Tomas Berdych 6-4, 6-7 (1/7), 6-3. `

Canadian 10th seed Milos Raonic struggled past Pablo Cuevas 7-5, 2-6, 7-6 (7/5) with 11 aces and three breaks of serve.

Czech’s Jiri Vesely reacts during his match against Serbia’s Novak Djokovic at the Monte-Carlo ATP Masters Series tournament, yesterday. INSET: Novak Djokovic of Serbia leaves the court after being defeated by Vesely.

RESULTSSecond Round

Benoit Paire (FRA x16) bt Joao Sousa

(POR) 6-4, 6-3

Stan Wawrinka (SUI x4) bt Philipp Kohls-

chreiber (GER) 7-6 (7-2), 7/5

Damir Dzumhur (BIH) bt Tomas Berdych

(CZE x6) 6-4, 6-7 (1/7), 6-3

Dominic Thiem (AUT) bt Taro Daniel

(JPN) 4-6, 6-2, 6-0

Rafael Nadal (ESP) bt Aljaz Bedene

(GBR) 6-3, 6-3

Milos Raonic (CAN x10) bt Pablo Cuevas

(URU) 7-5, 2-6, 7-6 (7/5)

Bosnia’s World No.99 Dzumhur defeats sixth seed Berdych in other upset of the day

TENNIS: MONTE CARLO MASTERS

Rafael Nadal of Spain returns the ball to Aljaz Bedene of Great Britain during their second round match at the Monte-Carlo Rolex Masters in Roquebrune Cap Martin, France, yesterday.

KOKLATA KNIGHT RIDERSR V Uthappa c Pollard b McClenaghan 8

G Gambhir c Patel b Pandya 64

M K Pandey c&b Harbhajan Singh 52

A D Russell b McClenaghan 36

Y K Pathan (not out) 9

C Munro (run out-Southee/Patel) 4

S A Yadav (not out) 4

Extras (LB-3, W-7) 10

Total (for 5 wkts in 20 overs) 187Fall of wickets: 1-21, 2-121, 3-164, 4-170,

5-183.

Bowling: T G Southee 4-0-43-0 (3w); J J

Bumrah 4-0-32-0; M J McClenaghan 4-0-25-2

(1w); H H Pandya 2-0-22-1 (1w); H arbhajan

Singh 4-0-31-1; J Suchith 2-0-31-0 (2w).

MUMBAI INDIANSR G Sharma (not out) 84

P A Patel (run out (Hogg/Uthappa) 23

H H Pandya c Pandey b Chawla 9

M J McClenaghan c Munro b K Yadav 20

J C Buttler c Yadav b Russell 41

K A Pollard (not out) 1

Extras (B-1, LB-1, W-8) 10

Total (for 4 wkts in 19.1 overs) 188Did not bat: A T Rayudu, Harbhajan Singh, J

Suchith, T G Southee, J J Bumrah.

Fall of wickets: 1-53, 2-87, 3-109, 4-175.

Bowling: A D Russell 4-0-52-1; J W Hastings

4-0-31-0 (2w); G B Hogg 4-0-37-0 (1w); P P

Chawla 3.1-0-29-1; Yadav 4-0-37-1 (1w).

Player-of-the-Match: R G Sharma (MI).

SCOREBOARD

Mumbai Indians captain Rohit Sharma plays a shot during the 2016 Indian Premier League (IPL) Twenty20 cricket match against Kolkata Knight Riders at the Eden Gardens Cricket Stadium in Kolkata yesterday.

IPL: Sharma, Buttler guide

Mumbai to impressive win

IANS

KOLKATA: Rohit Sharma’s love affair with Eden Gardens contin-ued as he smashed an unbeaten 84 to power Mumbai Indians to a six-wicket victory over Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) in an Indian Premier League (IPL) encounter here yes-terday.

Jos Buttler with a quickfire 22-ball 41 was the other major contributor.

For KKR, Andre Russell, Piyush Chawla and Kuldeep Yadav picked up a wicket each.

The defending champions started off at a brisk pace chasing KKR’s challenging 187-5 with Rohit and Parthiv Patel picking the gaps at will.

By the end of the powerplay, the score read 53-1. But then Brad Hogg effected a brilliant run-out and sent back Parthiv to the dugout much to the delight of the 35,000-odd fans in

the stadium. The wicket also helped KKR bring down the run rate.

Thereafter, some silly errors from wicket-keeper Robin Uthappa helped the visitors. Mumbai Indians got to 87-1 at the end of 10 overs.

KKR then got rid of Hardik Pan-dya (9) and Mitchell McClenaghan (20) in quick succession as they tried to slowly crawl their way back into the contest.

However, Buttler and Rohit had other ideas. The England power-hit-ter did not need a sighter and tonked the hapless KKR bowlers too all parts of the park. He also took on Andre Russell and clubbed him for 18 in an over.

The onslaught brought down the asking rate rapidly and before long Mumbai were in touching distance of the KKR total.

Earlier, fifties from Gau-tam Gambhir and Manish Pandey along with a quickfire 17-ball 36 from Andre Russell helped Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) post a challeng-ing score.

Five things to watch in ShanghaiAFP

CHANGHAI: Five talking points ahead of this week’s Chinese Grand Prix in Shanghai:

1. Will the real Lewis Hamilton please stand up?

Hamilton proved again last year that when in the mood he is sim-ply too quick to catch, his total dominance at times driving Mer-cedes team-mate Nico Rosberg to despair. But since clinch-ing his third world title in Texas last October, the Briton has gone completely off the boil, allowing Rosberg to rack up five succes-sive wins since the back end of last season. He needs a win in Shanghai this weekend to stop the German’s surge. Also in focus will be Hamilton’s attire, after he caused a stir at the Bahrain Grand Prix by turning up in traditional Middle Eastern clothing -- topped off with designer sunglasses and a thick gold chain.

2. A qualified successFans and teams alike will be

relieved that F1 is returning to last year’s qualifying format in Shang-hai after the failed experiment with ‘progressive elimination’ caused red faces in Australia and Bahrain. The new, one-by-one knock-out system left tracks embarrassingly empty at times and was much maligned by spectators and drivers alike. Teams pushed hard for a return to the old format immediately after the first season’s race in Melbourne -- and now it’s a case of better late than never after governing body the FIA relented.

3. Ferrari’s dodgy enginesGrowling menacingly during pre-

season testing, Ferrari’s engines suddenly resemble a second-hand Skoda’s -- and for no apparent rea-son. Sebastian Vettel’s Bahrain hopes went up in smoke when the engine of his Ferrari blew on the warm-up lap, after Kimi Raikkonen’s engine caught fire in the season opener in Australia. Ferrari mechan-ics will work overtime to solve this as they look to mount a challenge to the dominant Mercedes.

4. A pain in the Haas for old guard

Frenchman Romain Grosjean turned heads when he snatched a creditable sixth place for Ameri-can team Haas on their Formula One debut in Australia. But he went one better in Bahrain, steering the new-comers to fifth to fire a warning at the likes of Williams and Force India that their early results were no fluke.

5. Alonso hopes for all-clearFormer world champion Fern-

ando Alonso will be hoping to be passed fit to make his return for McLaren after being sidelined since his horror crash in the season-opener in Australia. Ruled out of the last race in Bahrain two weeks ago, the Spaniard will undergo further tests before being given the all-clear by Formula One’s ruling FIA.

SPORT 33THURSDAY 14 APRIL 2016

F1: Hamilton looks for more Shanghai success

Reuters

SHANGHAI: Lewis Hamil-ton has had more success in Shanghai than any other For-mula One driver, which makes Sunday’s Chinese Grand Prix the ideal location for the triple world champion to end Mercedes team-mate Nico Rosberg’s win-ning streak.

While Rosberg has started the season with a perfect 50 points from two races, and a run of five successive victories dating back to last November, Hamilton is ready to turn the tables.

The Briton has won four times in Shanghai and is on for three in a row after last season becoming the only driver to win the race in successive years.

“It’s not been a smooth start to the season for me, so to be in the championship position I’m in right now is actually pretty pos-itive,” said Hamilton.

Hamilton lies second in the standings after a second and a third place.

“Now we go to China for the next battle. It’s a track that’s been good to me over the years... so hopefully this race can be the turning point.”

Hamilton has not won since he took his third world cham-pionship in Austin, Texas, last October but the 31-year-old has started both races this season on pole position.

The decision to abandon a failed new live elimination qualifying format and revert to the 2015 version from Shang-hai onwards is unlikely to make much difference to Mercedes’ domination of the Saturday session.

While Hamilton is still the bookmakers’ favourite, Ros-berg has reasons of his own to be confident.

His first Formula One vic-tory came in Shanghai in 2012 and he stands on the cusp of his-tory with only three other drivers ever putting together a run of six or more wins in a row -- two of them also Germans.

Sebastian Vettel managed nine with Red Bull in 2013 and Michael Schumacher seven with Ferrari in 2004. The other was Italian Alberto Ascari in the 1950s.

Mercedes have won the last eight races but Hamilton, 17

points behind Rosberg, is not the only threat to the champi-onship leader.

Rivals Ferrari have yet to show their true pace, and might have won earlier without mishap, but Vettel and Kimi Raikkonen can count on plenty of local sup-port in a country where red is a lucky colour.

In Bahrain Vettel did not even start, his Ferrari engine coughing out plumes of smoke on the formation lap, but there will have been plenty of work back at the factory since then.

“We are pushing very hard and we know that we can still improve,” Vettel said after Bahrain.

Ferrari’s most recent winner was Fernando Alonso, in 2013.

Now at McLaren, the Span-iard’s participation depends on him passing a medical on Thurs-day after being forced to sit out the race in Bahrain on doctors’ orders following his horrific accident in Australia.

“While I hope I’ll be back in the cockpit on Friday (for prac-tice), until I get the all-clear from the doctors to race, whenever that may be, we cannot assume any-thing,” addressing media, Alonso said on Tuesday.

Belgian reserve Stoffel Van-doorne, who scored a point on his debut in Bahrain, remains on stand-by.

The British triple world champion aims to end Mercedes team-mate Nico Rosberg’s winning streak

This file photo taken on April 20, 2014 shows Mercedes AMG Petronas driver Lewis Hamilton of Britain lifting the trophy after winning the Formula One Chinese Grand Prix in Shanghai.

STATISTICS FOR THE CHINESE GRAND PRIX

��Lap distance: 5.451km Total distance: 305.066km (56 laps)

�� Race lap record: Michael Schumacher (Germany) Ferrari, one minute

32.238 seconds (2004)

��2015 pole: Lewis Hamilton (Britain) Mercedes

��2015 winner: Hamilton

��Start time: 0600 GMT/1400 local

WINS

�� Champions Mercedes have won the last eight races, with Rosberg

chasing his sixth win in a row after his victories in Australia and Bahrain.

��Seven other drivers have won five in a row in Formula One history and

all ended up as champion that season. Only Germany’s Sebastian Vettel (nine

in a row), compatriot Michael Schumacher and Italy’s Alberto Ascari (seven

each) have won more than five in a row.

��Mercedes also won eight races in a row between Italy 2014 and Aus-

tralia 2015.

��Mercedes won 16 of the 19 races last season, with a record 12 one-two

finishes. Ferrari won the other three.

��Hamilton, now a triple world champion, has 43 career victories, putting

him third in the all-time lists and one win ahead of Ferrari’s four-times world

champion Sebastian Vettel.

��Schumacher holds the record of 91, with Alain Prost on 51.

POLE POSITION

��Hamilton’s pole in Bahrain was the 51st of his career, the third most of

all time. Michael Schumacher had a record 68 and the late Brazilian Ayrton

Senna 65.

��The Briton has been on pole in both races this season. He had 11 poles

last season to Rosberg’s seven and Vettel’s one. Vettel has 46 career poles,

Rosberg 22.

�� Mercedes have been one-two on the starting grid in the last eight

races.

POINTS

��Mercedes and Williams are the only teams to have scored points with

both cars in both races this season.

CHINA

�� Hamilton is the most successful there with four wins (2008, 2011,

2014, 2015), and is the only driver to win two years in a row, while Alonso

has two (2005, 2013).

Fiji are ‘team to beat’ in Rio, says coachAFP

SINGAPORE: Fiji are the “team to beat” at the Rio Olym-pics, coach Ben Ryan said yesterday as he eyed sealing back-to-back victories in Singapore.

Ryan said the reigning world series champions had been buoyed by last week’s Hong Kong Sevens win, but he also warned against overconfidence.

Singapore is returning to the world series this week as the eighth of 10 stops this year -- and with rugby’s return to the Olympics looming in August.

“We did want to go to the Olympic Games as number one seeds... and we’re happy with that favourites tag,” Ryan said.

“I know the history of Olympic team sports often means that the number one team in the world going into that Olympic sport often doesn’t win but we still think we’re better off being number one than number two.

“We’ll put it out there that we will be the team to beat. Anyone that beats us will probably win the gold medal.”

Ryan said Fiji also took heart from their record in three-day tournaments -- the Rio format -- after win-ning four out four in the past two years.

“If another team suddenly smashes the next three tournaments then that might change things,” the Eng-lishman said.

“But we’ve had four three-day tournaments, the same as Rio, in the last two years and Fiji has won every single one of them.”

Fiji beat rivals New Zealand 21-7 in Sunday’s Hong Kong final as they sent out a message before the Olym-pics and stretched their championship lead to five points.

“Confidence is high but we have to make sure we don’t get over-confident... I’m keeping the pressure on the boys this week,” Ryan said.

For Ryan and his men, an Olympic gold medal will have added significance given this year’s cyclone dis-aster in the nation of 900,000 people.

Fiji is still reeling from super cyclone Winston in February, which left 44 dead, 60,000 homeless and crippled infrastructure.

“We’ve had players that have lost their houses, fam-ilies that have lost their businesses. It’s been a tough time, we now have food shortages and the cost of food has doubled,” he said.

“It’s tough and the boys will go back and do their bit and give their winnings to their families,” he added.

“An Olympic win will go beyond rugby. That will boost all our younger athletes to think that if those 12 players from their villages can go to the Olympic Games, then why can’t they do it in other sports?”

Sonny Bill thrills fan, 8, with latest giveawayAFP

HONG KONG: An eight-year-old boy has posted a video online to thank Sonny Bill Williams for giving him his Hong Kong Sevens runner-up trophy -- echoing the All Blacks star’s selfless act at the World Cup final.

Young fan Cooper Rodda was upset after New Zea-land lost 21-7 to Fiji in Sunday’s Hong Kong final. But he cheered up when double World Cup-winner Williams agreed to a selfie after the presentations.

And he was then astonished as the burly former rugby league star unexpectedly handed him his run-ners-up silver tankard and walked away.

It was not the first act of kindness by Williams, who famously gave away his World Cup winner’s medal to a young fan on the pitch at Twickenham last year.

“My mom asked him for a selfie... and then when he gave my mom her iPhone back he also gave me this awesome HK Sevens runner-up trophy,” Rodda says in his YouTube video, holding up the engraved tank-ard and wearing an All Blacks shirt.

“He’s, like, one of the most nicest guys in the world. I’m his number one fan so thank you Sonny Bill for giv-ing me this.”

Rodda’s mother, Tan Guerin-Rodda, told the South China Morning Post: “Sonny took a selfie with us and just walked off.

“It was (my husband) Jeff who said, ‘Oh my God, did you just see what he did?’ I was just gobsmacked. We had no idea that would happen, we were caught unaware.”

The family are originally from Hawkes Bay in New Zealand and moved to Hong Kong two years ago, according to the newspaper report.

Coop Rodda poses with Sonny Bill Williams’ runner’s up trophy.

Mercedes AMG Petronas F1 Team’s British driver Lewis Hamilton competes to place third in the Bahrain Formula One Grand Prix at the Sakhir Circuit in Manama in this April 3, 2016 file photo.

SPORT34 THURSDAY 14 APRIL 2016

Washington Capitals’ players celebrate after scoring a goal against the St Louis Blues during the first period of their NHL game at Scottrade Center in St Louis last Sunday.

Capitals look to reverse fortunes in play-offs

Reuters

NEW YORK: So much went right for Russian sniper Alex Ovechkin and his Washington Capitals this sea-son that they might finally be set to reverse years of postseason heart-break when the Stanley Cup play-offs open this week.

Ovechkin was the National Hockey League’s top scorer for a fourth straight year with 50 goals, goalie Braden Holtby tied the all-time mark for single-season wins with 48 and Washington won the Presidents’ Trophy for finishing first overall.

The 16-team play-offs, with the winner of four gruelling best-of-seven series earning the coveted Stanley Cup in June. Washington begin their series today against the Philadelphia Flyers.

Among the other key match-ups, Canadian Sidney Crosby’s Pittsburgh Penguins will face the New York Rangers, while the defending Stanley Cup champion Chicago Blackhawks will start on the road against the St Louis Blues.

Ovechkin and the Capitals have first-hand knowledge that a success-ful regular season is no guarantee of play-off success.

Since the Russian standout joined Washington in 2005, the Capitals have never been beyond the second round and have lost a decisive sev-enth game in three of the past four years.

“You have to have luck on your side, you have to be healthy, and you have to be focusing one hundred per-cent, because the playoffs are totally different hockey,” said Ovechkin.

“Every game is like the last game.”In the past 10 seasons, only the

2007-08 Detroit Red Wings and 2012-13 Chicago Blackhawks have finished first overall in the regu-lar season and gone on to win the Stanley Cup.

“Every player that’s in that room, growing up, no matter when they started playing the game, they were playing for the Stanley Cup, they never played for the Presidents’ Tro-phy,” said Capitals coach Barry Trotz.

“We all would like to be in that position to play for the one Cup that we all dreamed about when you’re playing on the streets or in the hallways of the house or hotel or whatever. That’s the one that we want to play for.”

The emergence of centre Evgeny Kuznetsov, in his second full season, and addition of TJ Oshie from a trade with the St Louis Blues has buoyed the hopes of the Eastern Conference’s Capitals as they have provided sec-ondary scoring to Ovechkin.

An Eastern Conference team has not won the Stanley Cup since the Boston Bruins in 2011 as Chi-cago (2015, 2013) and the Los Angeles Kings (2014, 2012) have won the last four championships.

Chicago, looking to become the NHL’s first repeat champion since the

1997-98 Detroit Red Wings, lost key players in Patrick Sharp, Brad Rich-ards and Brandon Saad last offseason through trades and free agency to stay within the NHL’s salary limits.

But they still have captain Jonathan Toews, forwards Patrick Kane and Marian Hossa as well as defensemen Duncan Keith and Brent Seabrook, a core group that has won three Stanley Cups together in the past six years.

However, the group has played together in 65 postseason games dur-ing the previous three years and will need to dig deep if they are to make another deep run.

For the first time in 46 years, the play-offs will not have a Canadian-based team competing. Back in 1970, there only were two Canadian teams in the a 12-team league, compared to seven in the 30-team NHL today.

Detroit dropped their final two regular season games but still squeaked into the play-offs and extended the longest active streak of postseason appearances in the his-tory of professional North American sports to 25 years.

Alex Ovechkin of the Washington Capitals acknowledges the fans and celebrates his 500th career NHL goal in a game against Ottawa Senators in Washington, in this January 2016 file photo.

NHL: STANLEY CUP PLAY-OFFS

Ovechkin’s team starts series against Philadelphia Flyers as Pittsburgh Penguins face the New York Rangers

Indiana Pacers seal seventh seed, avoid LeBron’s Cavs AFP

LOS ANGELES: The Indiana Pacers clinched the seventh seed in the East-ern Conference with a 102-90 victory over New York on Tuesday, avoiding a daunting opening post season with Cleveland.

The Pacers win coupled with the Miami Heat’s 99-93 victory at Detroit means Indiana will now play second seeded Toronto in the first round of the play-offs.

Detroit, who squeezed into the post season at the expense of the Chi-cago Bulls, will face LeBron James and the Cavaliers.

Indiana recovered from a first-quarter blitz that saw New York score 36 points.

Nineteen points each from Paul George and George Hill anchored the Indiana effort as the Pacers wrapped up a 26-15 record at home during the regular season, 44-37 overall.

“Teams hit their stride at dif-ferent times in the season, and we were hoping to enter the playoffs with some momentum,” said Indiana coach Frank Vogel, whose team travel to Milwaukee for their final game.

“We got a great game tonight from George Hill, who we ask to play his game and be aggressive. He does whatever he is asked.”

New York’s Derrick Williams top-scored for the Knicks with 21 points,

while Jerian Grant chipped in with 18 and Arron Afflalo 13.

The Knicks finished the season with a 32-50 record.

“The Knicks came out hot and negated what we were trying to do, but then our defensive pressure got better, and we were able to get con-trol of the game defensively,” George said.

“In the second half, we got some stops and got some easy opportuni-ties, a lot of transition plays.”

Knicks coach Kurt Rambis bemoaned his team’s failure to blunt the Pacers attack.

“They were allowed to pene-trate, and that created confusion in our defence and allowed them to get open scoring opportunities,” Ram-bis said.

“Paul George got himself going, and a lot of that had to do with our execution.”

Meanwhile in Michigan, the Pis-tons tumbled to defeat as Miami improved their chances of securing home-court advantage for the open-ing round of play-offs.

Luol Deng scored 17 points and 10 rebounds while Goran Dragic finished with 16 points for the Heat (48-33). Hassan Whiteside weighed in with 14 points and nine rebounds while Dwyane Wade chipped in 14 points.

Heat rookie forward Justise Win-slow was missing after suffering an ankle sprain.

Kentavious Caldwell-Pope was Detroit’s highest scorer with 17 points. Marcus Morris added 16 points and nine rebounds.

Elsewhere on Tuesday, San Anto-nio scored a 102-98 victory over the Oklahoma City Thunder, with Kawhi Leonard scoring 26 points, to snap a three-game losing streak.

Leonard drained a jumper with 49 seconds left in the extra period to put the Spurs 100-98 ahead before Tony Parker added two free throws with 12 seconds to go.

The win saw the Spurs tie the 1985-86 Boston Celtics for most home victories in a single season in NBA history (40).

San Antonio’s 66 wins is also a new franchise single-season record. The Spurs had already secured the second seeding in the Western Con-ference and complete their campaign on Wednesday against Dallas.

The Thunder, who rested stars Kevin Durant, Russell Westbrook and Serge Ibaka, will be seeded third in the Western Conference in the play-offs.

NBA RESULTSIndiana 102 NY Knicks 90

Miami 99 Detroit 93

Toronto 122 Philadelphia 98

San Antonio 102 Oklahoma City 98

LA Clippers 110 Memphis 84

Rodney Stuckey (left) of the Indiana Pacers shoots the ball during the game against the New York Knicks at Bankers Life Fieldhouse on Monday in Indianapolis, Indiana.

Blount re-signs with New England PatriotsAgencies

NEW YORK: Running back LeGarrette Blount re-signed with the New England Patriots to a one-year deal worth up to $2m including incentives.

Blount, an unrestricted free agent, has signed three times with the Patriots. A chipped hip bone caused Blount to miss the final six games of last season, including the play-offs, but he scored six touchdowns.

Meanwhile, free-agent cornerback Leon Hall remains unsigned and it was recently revealed that he underwent back surgery following the 2015 season.

Hall, a nine-year veteran, has spent his entire career with the Cincinnati Bengals. Cincinnati color analyst Dave

Lapham told radio station WCKY that Hall underwent the procedure to repair a disk.

Washington Redskins running back Silas Redd was suspended indefinitely without pay for a violation of the NFL Policy and Program for Substances of Abuse.

The league announced that Redd’s suspension will begin immediately. It is his second substance-abuse sus-pension in five months.

The Buffalo Bills agreed to terms with linebacker Lorenzo Alexander and safety Colt Anderson, the team announced. Alexander, 32, has played nine NFL seasons and was a member of the Oakland Raiders last season.

The NFL invited 25 players to attend the annual draft later this month in Chicago, the league announced.

The list of invitees includes a record-tying five play-ers from Ohio State.

BASEBALL RESULTSDetroit 8 Pittsburgh 2

Arizona 4 LA Dodgers 2

Washington 2 Atlanta 1

Philadelphia 3 San Diego 0

NY Yankees 3 Toronto 2

Baltimore 9 Boston 5

Tampa Bay 5 Cleveland 1

Miami 2 NY Mets 1

Kansas City 3 Houston 2

San Francisco 7 Colorado 2

Texas 8 Seattle 0

MLB: Diamondbacks, Tampa Bay Rays register wins Agencies

NEW YORK: The Los Angeles bullpen gave up three runs and Arizona rallied at Dodger Stadium as Nick Ahmed hit a solo home run off Pedro Baez to tie the score at 1 in the top of the seventh inning and Paul Goldschmidt put the Diamondbacks ahead for good in the eighth with a home run to left-centre field off Chris Hatcher.

Rays 5, Indians 1When it comes to winning

strategies, the Tampa Bay Rays are get-ting good at go-ahead eighth-inning home runs.

Both their wins this season had come that way, and on Tuesday night, it was second baseman Logan Forsythe who ripped a two-out, full-count, two-run home run to left field off starter Corey Kluber to spark the Rays to a 5-1 win over the Cleveland Indians at Tropicana Field.

Tigers 8, Pirates 2Justin Upton blasted his first home

run for Detroit as part of a four-hit afternoon, lifting the Tigers to an 8-2

victory over the Pittsburgh Pirates on Tuesday.

Upton, who signed a six-year, $132.75m contract as a free agent in January, scored three runs and drove in two.

His first-inning homer traveled an estimated 451 feet and landed in the camera well in straightaway center at Comerica Park.

Nationals 2, Braves 1Bryce Harper had a two-run dou-

ble down the left field line off Eric O’Flaherty with two outs in the eighth as the Washington Nationals beat the

Atlanta Braves 2-1 on Tuesday. The hit by Harper bounced off the glove of a diving Jeff Francoeur, who almost made a brilliant catch near the stands.

The Braves are now 0-7 this sea-son and have lost their last 12 games at Nationals Park. Washington improved to 5-1 and is 25-9 against Atlanta since June 21, 2014.

Phillies 3, Padres 0Charlie Morton combined with

three relievers on a four-hit shutout as the Philadelphia Phillies beat the San Diego Padres 3-0 Tuesday night.

Odubel Herrera and Maikel Franco

drove in runs for Philadelphia, which won for the third time in four games. The other Phillies run came home on an eighth-inning error. San Diego (3-5) lost for the second time in three games, while Philadelphia (3-5) won for the third time in four games.

Yankees 3, Blue Jays 2Brian McCann tied the score with

a sixth-inning homer, Jacoby Ellsbury singled in the go-ahead run in the seventh and the New York Yankees defeated the Toronto Blue Jays 3-2 on Tuesday night.

Jose Bautista hit a two-run double

in the third inning to give the Blue Jays (3-5) a 2-1 lead in the opener of the three-game series against the Yankees (4-2).

SPORT 35THURSDAY 14 APRIL 2016

AFP

LOS ANGELES: British boxer Amir Khan believes the fear factor could help him score a shock victory next month when he steps up in class to face Mexico’s World Boxing Coun-cil middleweight champion Canelo Alvarez in Las Vegas.

Khan, 29, raised eyebrows across the boxing world earlier this year after announcing his May 7 fight at the T-Mobile Arena against Alvarez, the hard-hitting 25-year-old from Guadalajara.

It represents a risky move for Khan, who has never previously fought above the welterweight limit of 147 pounds (66.7 kilograms). Alva-rez is the overwhelming favourite

with most oddsmakers. Khan, however, who is now based in San Francisco with trainer Virgil Hunter, believes facing an opponent as chal-lenging as Alvarez can bring out the best in him.

“Obviously we don’t want to walk into a fight and get hurt,” said Khan, who is 31-3 since turning profes-sional after winning a silver medal at the 2004 Athens Olympics at the age of 17.

“By me taking this fight, I will be more focused. I know I can’t make mistakes against this guy,” Khan said in a conference call.

“I’ve made mistakes in the past at other weights because I thought I was more gifted than them, I knew I was more skilled and a better fighter than them guys.”

“They can be my worse oppo-nents because I don’t really have that fear element.

“But when you’re fighting some-one who is tough, dangerous it is going to be a tough fight and that is what brings my ‘A’ game out.”

Khan is unbeaten in five fights, with the last of his three defeats a fourth round technical knockout by Danny Garcia in 2012.

The Briton boxer said that being an underdog against Alvarez will suit him, confident that his hand speed

and elusiveness can help against a naturally stronger opponent.

“I know I’m not going to be stronger than him,” Khan said.

“It’s the first fight I’m walking into as the underdog and that’s good. Because I can prove to people that this is where I belong.”

Khan’s trainer Hunter mean-while confessed he was reluctant to accept the bout when it was first made.

“I wasn’t for the fight. What changed my outlook on it was Amir’s response to me when I asked him why did he want this fight and his response to me was quite assuring that he understood what he was going up against and what he was getting into,” Hunter said.

“I don’t view Amir as an under-dog. I’d be doing him a disservice if I viewed him as an underdog. I view him as the top dog.”

The 29-year-old British champion faces his first middleweight test as he takes on WBC champion in May

Record holder Peaty books swimming place in RioReuters

LONDON: Triple world champion Adam Peaty booked his place at the Rio Games by winning the 100 metres breaststroke at the British Olympic trials in Glasgow in a time of 58.41 seconds on Tuesday.

The mark, if nowhere near the 21-year-old’s own world record of 57.92 that he set at the same national championships last year, was faster than August’s world championship-winning time of 58.52.

“Just qualified for my first Olym-pic Games, no other feeling like competing for your country at this level,” he said on Twitter.

Despite being a big hope for gold, Peaty said he had taken nothing for granted despite being world cham-pion at the distance.

“The pressure is off now, which

is great,” he told the British Swim-ming website.

“I know that wasn’t near my best, I’m glad that I came first but I know what went wrong and what went well in that race. Hopefully next time I can get out a bit faster and come back stronger.”

Peaty won world championship titles in the 100 and 50 breaststroke in Kazan, Russia last year as well as the 4x100 mixed medley relay and is hoping to become the first male Brit-ish swimmer to capture Olympic gold in 28 years.

The relay and 50 are not in the Olympic programme but Peaty is also aiming for the 200 breaststroke, a distance he has not swum since Janu-ary. That trial event is on Friday.

Double world champion James Guy dominated in the 400 freestyle final by clocking three minutes 43.84, also well inside the Olympic consid-eration time.

“The pressure is off now and I can enjoy the rest of the meet,” he said. “I know I can make little improvements now ahead of the summer.”

Hannah Miley, a 400 women’s individual medley silver medallist at the 2011 Shanghai champion-ships, won her event in 4:33.40 which should also see her safely on the plane to Rio in August for her third Games.

British swimmers won only three medals, a silver for Michael Jamieson in the 200 breaststroke and freestyle bronzes for now-retired Rebecca Adlington, at their home Games in London in 2012 but are hoping to strike gold in Rio.

The British team is due to be announced next week.

AMIR KHAN: FACT FILE

Nickname: King

Rated at: Lightweight, Light-welterweight,

Welterweight

Height: 5 ft 8 1⁄2 in (174 cm)

Reach: 71 in (180 cm)

Nationality: British

Born: December 08, 1986 (age 29) in England

BOXING RECORD

Total fights: 34, Wins: 31, Wins by KO: 19

Losses: 3

MEDAL RECORD

Silver medal at Athens Olympic Games 2004

(Lightweight)

British boxer Amir Khan

SWIMMING:BRITISH OLYMPIC TRIALS

Britain’s triple world champion and double world record holder Adam Peaty.

Payday for Azerbaijan’s

golden girl KostovaReuters

FORDE, NORWAY: Bulgarian-born Boyanka Kostova won a gold medal for Azerbaijan at the European cham-pionships in Norway on Tuesday and is set to reap the financial rewards offered by her adopted nation.

Kostova, 22, won her third Euro-pean gold when she retained her women’s 58kg title, after comforta-bly beating her nearest rival, Irina Lepsa, of Romania. Poland’s Joanna Lochowska was third.

“My training and preparation for this championships went well and I was pleased today,” said Kos-tova, who was named female athlete of the year by the International Weightlifting Federation after the world championships in November.

“If all goes well, and I am in my best form at the Olympics, maybe I will try for another world record.”

Kostova said she did not know how big her state-funded reward would be, but Azerbaijan often pays huge sums to medallists at major competitions. Two wrestlers who won gold at London 2012 were paid $510,000 each.

Azerbaijan offers fast-track nationalisation to athletes in a range of sports, among them Russian gymnasts, American and Cana-dian ice skaters and the Bulgarian weightlifters.

After Kostova won gold at the 2010 Youth Olympic Games for her native Bulgaria, at the age of 17, she was offered the chance to switch allegiance to Azerbaijan, along with another top teenager, Valen-tin Hristov.

The Azerbaijanis paid $550,000 to the Bulgarian federation.

Hristov became Azerbaijan’s first Olympic medallist in the sport when he won a bronze at London 2012, at the age of 18, but he has since twice failed dope tests and faces a life-time ban.

Kostova will go to Brazil as favourite. At the world champi-onships in Houston, she broke the world record in the snatch (112kg) and total (252kg), but she lifted well within her capabilities in Forde.

Her first snatch attempt at 95kg, which she made look ridiculously easy, was 2kg better than any of her nine rivals but 14kg lower than her opening effort in Houston.

Another Olympic hopeful, the improving Daniyar Ismayilov, made it three golds in three days for Tur-key when he won the men’s 69kg.

Ismayilov was well clear of silver

medallist Sergei Petrov, of Russia. Because of so many failed lifts by medal contenders, the bronze went to a B Group lifter, David Sanchez Lopez, of Spain.

Hungary’s Noel Nagy set a record when he made his international debut in the Men’s 77kg C Group. At 46, he is the oldest competitor in the history of the championships.

Boyanka Kostova of Azerbaijan competes in the women’s 58kg weight class during the 2015 International Weightlifting Federation World Championships at the George R. Brown Convention Center in this November 23, 2015 file photo in Houston, Texas.

Rio golfers must

be snappy

with alligators

lurking

Reuters

RIO DE JANEIRO: Slow rounds are common in world golf but players competing at the Olym-pics in August may need to be snappier than usual as they will have alliga-tors, capybaras and other wildlife for company.

The new Olympic golf course was built in a spec-tacular area surrounded by lagoons that are home to several species of wild animals including alliga-tors, according to local media reports.

At least five biolo-gists will be on hand in case the reptiles need to be moved away from players or spectators, said the Folha de S.Paulo newspaper.

Authorities are also set to erect signs issu-ing warnings about the nearby wildlife.

Golf is returning at the Rio de Janeiro Olympics after a 112-year absence from the Games and the course was built a few miles from the neighbour-hood of Jacarepegua, which means Alligator Lagoon.

Rivers in local parks are filled with alligators while capybaras, the world’s largest rodents, are also commonly sighted.

Khan to ride on Khan to ride on fear factor atfear factor atAlvarez showdownAlvarez showdown

36 THURSDAY 14 APRIL 2016

Qatar eye tri-nations title at home event

The Peninsula

DOHA: The Qatar Rugby Federation will host the tri-nations Asia Rugby Championship (ARC) Division III at the Aspire warm up and purpose built rugby track from April 16, it was announced here yesterday.

The national rugby teams of Leb-anon and Iran will be in Doha for the competition in hope of claiming the ARC Division III title.

The championship is organised by Qatar Rugby Federation (QRF) in cooperation with Qatar Olympic Committee (QOC)

The first match of the competition will see Qatar battling with peninsula friends Iran on April 16. The match is scheduled to start at 6pm.

Three days later, on April 19, Iran will be involved in the second match this time against Middle East counter-parts Lebanon. The match will start at 7pm.

On April 22, Qatar will slug it out with Lebanon for the tournament’s final match. The match is scheduled for a 6pm start.

The last nine weeks Qatar Sevens

Rugby has dominated the rugby head-lines but now rugby XV’s much to the delight of many has the front page. This tournament is open to extra par-ticipants (15 players) many of whom Sevens excludes due to their bulky and heavy frames.

This will be the first time the Asia Rugby Championship will be played in Doha since it changed its name from the HSBC Asian 5 Nations in 2015.

Qatar made an impact in its debut at the A5N in 2011 Division IV beating Lebanon and Jordan for the cham-pionship in Dubai. In the 2013 A5N held in Kuala Lumpur, Qatar crushed China 76 – Nil and overcame a strong Guam 13 -7 to win the finals.

In 2014, the A5N was held in Qatar at the Al Arabi Stadium. Qatar beat Thailand and Iran to advance to the finals which they lost to Malaysia.

The ARC matches will be played across 80 minutes divided into two lots 40 minute halves with a 10 minute break. Teams will consist of 23 players and are allowed 8 reserves.

The tri-nations competition will be played in a single pool round robin format.

Competition points will be awarded on the following basis: Win 4 points, Draw 2 points, 4 or more tries 1 point and a loss by 7 points or less 1 point.

Speaking about the champion-ship captain of the Qatar national team Tom Featherstone said: “We are ready to beat both teams. We are playing to win. We are very strong in the forwards with plenty of experi-ence there and that’s where we will be playing them.”

“The Iranians are very physical and like playing it close to the middle while the Lebanese are more flam-boyant with their play and will throw the ball out wide to their backs. What-ever strategy both teams play we are ready for the counteract,” Feather-stone added.

Featherstone who has been a res-ident of Qatar since 7 years old has played 8 caps with the Qatar national

XV’s team and was part of the Qatar Rugby Sevens National side that com-peted in Al Ain earlier this year.

He said: “Rugby is in my blood I don’t know of any other sport to play. Full credit to the QRF for their recent Sevens championship and their role they are playing in promoting Rugby in Qatar. This can only improve and as a result the sport will attract good quality players and coaches”.

QRF General Secretary Ali Al Malki thanked all the sponsors and paid tribute to the Copthorne Hotel who will be hosting the teams.

“We are delighted at the oppor-tunity of hosting the tournament with Asia Rugby. This tournament will be the biggest challenge for the Federation to date. I call on all the sports community to join us and show the world that we are capa-ble of hosting and presenting world class events.”

“The QRF wish to thank its partners the QOC, the Aspire Foun-dation Zone and IEC for their ongoing

support. I wish to also acknowledge Kabalan Frangieh the General Man-ager of the Copthorne Hotel who has been a willing partner in the devel-opment of Rugby playing host to the Lebanese and Iranian national rugby teams and holding all events for the Asia Championship”.

“We are very happy the QRF chose

the Copthorne Hotel as their partner. The QRF is working hard to develop rugby in Qatar and we are excited to be part of that visionary process. The Copthorne Hotel is a strong supporter of community sports and we will do our best to deliver the best service which can only reflect on Qatar as a whole,” Frangieh said.

Asia Rugby Championship Division III series to kick off on April 16 at Aspire Zone

FROM LEFT: General Manager of IEC Joe Karrat, Qatar National Rugby captain Tom Featherstone, Qatar Rugby Federation (QRF) Team Manager Hamad Anbar Abdulla, General Manager Copthorne Hotel Kabalan Frangieh QRF Senior Coordinator Samuel Rico, pose for a picture after a press conference in Doha yesterday. The Qatar Rugby Federation will host the tri-nations Asia Rugby Championship Division III from April 16. RIGHT: Qatar national team training at Aspire Zone ahead of the championship. Besides hosts Qatar, Iran and Lebanon are the other teams taking part in the championship.

Klopp calls for bravery in Dortmund showdownAFP

LIVERPOOL: Liverpool manager Jurgen Klopp has instructed his players to forget about their slen-der away-goal advantage ahead of today’s Europa League quarter-final second leg against his former club Borussia Dortmund.

Liverpool secured a 1-1 draw in last week’s first leg in Germany, with Divock Origi’s first-half opener for the visitors cancelled out by a header from Mats Hummels.

But with Dortmund having plun-dered 119 goals in all competitions this season, Klopp does not expect Origi’s goal to prove decisive.

“I think we can ignore the first leg,” said the German, for whom the Europa League represents the last chance to crown his maiden season with a piece of silverware.

“This Dortmund team can score goals. They are not an opponent where you can go into a game think-ing we can keep a clean sheet. Maybe after 85 minutes it (the away goal) will be relevant, but not earlier.

“It is a completely normal game and the crowd is more of an advan-tage if we are good and if they like the game they will help us more than the goal in Dortmund.

“Only when we play 0-0 it is a real advantage. If we win we don’t need it; if we lose it isn’t helpful.

“This is a new start and we will see who handles the situation better. Who is more clear in their offensive action, who is more disciplined in defence, who is brave enough to take a chance?

“In my opinion the atmosphere

will be the biggest difference.” The first leg took place amid a fervent atmosphere at the Westfalensta-dion, where kick-off was preceded by a stirring communal rendition of the clubs’ shared anthem, ‘You’ll Never Walk Alone’.

Scarves will be held aloft and the words of the 1945 show tune belted out again at Anfield today, while there will also be a pre-match minute’s silence to mark the 27th anniversary of the 1989 Hillsborough disaster, in which 96 Liverpool fans lost their lives.

In addition, supporters of both clubs will hold up coloured mosaics forming ‘96’.

On the pitch, Klopp’s most press-ing selection dilemma concerns whether to keep faith with Daniel Sturridge up front or turn back to Origi, who followed up his goal in

Dortmund with a brace in Sunday’s 4-1 defeat of Stoke City after coming on in place of Sturridge.

Captain Jordan Henderson will be absent after sustaining a season-end-ing knee injury in the first leg, with fellow England midfielder James Mil-ner in line to inherit the armband.

Dortmund went into the tie as competition favourites, but strug-gled to cope with Liverpool’s pressing and were then held to a 2-2 draw by hated local rivals Schalke at the weekend that left them seven points below leaders Bayern Munich in the Bundesliga.

Dortmund coach Thomas Tuchel used the opportunity to rest eight first-team players, including star forwards Marco Reus and Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, and will restore his big guns to his starting line-up today.

Athletic’s goalkeeper Gorka Iraizoz smiles during a training session at the Sanchez Pizjuan Stadium in Seville on the eve of the UEFA Europa League quarter finals second leg match against Sevilla FC.

Djamel Belmadi (left), coach of Lekhwiya speaking during a press conference in Doha yesterday. Lekhwiya take on Meisameer in the last round match of the Qatar Stars League tomorrow.

Lekhwiya aim to finish QSL season on a winning noteThe Peninsula

DOHA: Lekhwiya will take on already-relegated side Al Mesaimeer at the Lekhwiya Stadium in Round 26 of the Qatar Stars League.

Lekhwiya have confirmed a fourth place finish this season and the last round match will have no effect on the standings for the Red Knights, which will compete in the Qatar Cup for another season.

Djamel Belmadi, coach of Lekhwiya hopes to get back to win-ning ways in the last game>

“In terms of target there is no tar-get for us or them as Mesaimeer have been relegated. In our last game we

didn’t plan to lose against Al Ahli. Five goals are a lot to concede and we need to change some things in the team before our Champions League game in Uzbekistan.”

“In a meeting with our players we said we lack consistency. We had some good periods as we had 9 wins in a row. Consistency has been a big issue for us as our squad was not pre-pared for playing in many different competitions,” added the Algerian tactician.

Motivation is key in the last stages of the season as minds and legs get tired. Belmadi believes that the play-ers must work until the end of the season till the job is done.

“It’s difficult to find motivation in the end of the season but I believe

you have to do your job till the end. If the players want motivation for this last match they need to think about the last match against Al Ahli, in which we conceded 5 goals and to erase the memory of that,” added the forty-year-old.

Mesaimeer have already been relegated from the QSL and will ply their trade in the Qatar Gas league next season. With only six points from twenty-five games, the Torches will hope to end the season with three points.

Despite a disappointing sea-son Rodion Gacanin, coach of Al Mesaimeer insists that he is proud of his players.

“We have shown good character over the season.”

Asia Rugby Championship

Division III FixturesApril 16

Qatar vs Iran, 6.00pm

April 19Iran vs Lebanon, 6.00pm

April 22Qatar vs Lebanon, 6.00pm

Venue: Aspire Zone

QATAR NATIONAL XV’S SQUAD Players: Thomas Nolan, Jamie Frost, Aaron Salmon, Aaron Palmer, Huw Kinsella, Mark

O’Donnell, Tom Featherstone, Neil Thomas, Robbie Gaule, Paul Beard, Mubarak Al

Malik, David Saxon, Jonathan Davis, Rakan Mutawaa, Timothy Newnham, Talal Mujalli,

Joseph Dharshan Goonetilleke, Malcolm Reid, Abdulaziz Al Dosari, Shane Watson,

Asad Ali, Grant Finn, Oliver Scudamore, Matthew Uffindall, Abdul Karem Al Muhannadi.

Coach: Aaron Palmer, Assistant Coaches: Caine Elisara and Brook Tremayne.

Manager: Nick Thurston