Wednesday 17 June 2020

25 Shawwal - 1441

2 Riyals

www.thepeninsula.qa

Volume 25 | Number 8291

BUSINESS | 01 PENMAG | 03 SPORT | 08

Qatar 2022

will unite

the world:

Al Thawadi

Classifieds

and Services

section

included

Global gas

demand may

fall by 2-5% in

2020: GECF

MoCI welcomes WTO ruling against Saudi violations of IP rights, promotion of piracyQNA — DOHA

The Ministry of Commerce and Industry (MoCI) of the State of Qatar has welcomed yester-day’s ruling by the World Trade Organisation (WTO) finding that the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia has breached Intellectual Property (IP) Rights by refusing to take action against beoutQ piracy channel, and instead actively promoting this piracy.

The WTO’s ruling found that the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia has breached its obligations under the WTO Agreement on Trade-related Aspects of Intel-lectual Property Rights (“TRIPS Agreement”) and failed to protect intellectual property IP rights by refusing to take action against, and instead actively promoting, sophisticated Saudi based broadcast pirate “beoutQ”.

The WTO Panel has called on Saudi Arabia to stop its abuse of IP rights and “bring its measures into conformity” with

WTO law.This is the first time in the

73-year history of the WTO and its predecessor (the GATT) that a

Panel has rejected a respondent’s attempt to invoke the national security exception as a defence.

The WTO Panel found that Saudi Arabia’s failure to take criminal action against beoutQ was so disconnected from any legitimate security interest that it could not meet even “a minimum requirement of plau-sibility in relation to the proffered essential security interests”.

Reacting to the Panel Report, Minister of Commerce and Industry, H E Ali bin Ahmed Al Kuwari said in a statement to QNA: “Qatar, and interna-tional rights holders, have scored a resounding victory today. We expect Saudi Arabia, especially since it is hosting the upcoming G20, to respect this decisive ruling and end the theft and piracy of IP rights at once. They can start by heeding the WTO’s ruling and conducting a fair, timely, and transparent legal proceeding against the perpetrators in order to stop this abuse posthaste.”

The ruling came after the State of Qatar filed a formal com-plaint against the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia through the WTO’s Dispute Settlement Body.

In its report published yes-terday, the WTO Panel con-cluded that beoutQ has been pirating copyrighted media content of Qatari company beIN Media Group LLP (beIN) in Saudi Arabia and beyond, including through the sale of beoutQ subscriptions and set-top decoder boxes at numerous retail outlets across Saudi Arabia.

The report said that in addition to pirating beIN’s pro-prietary and licensed sports content, the beoutQ boxes allow access to thousands of pirated movies, TV shows, and TV channels from around the globe, and pirate broadcasts have been transmitted via Saudi-based Arabsat satellite frequencies and a Saudi company, Saudi Selevision Company LLC, has “allowed or assisted beoutQ to broadcast its pirated content on Arabsat”.

The report stressed that the piracy has been conducted on a “commercial scale”. The Panel concluded this after considering evidence revealing the com-mercial purpose of beoutQ, such as the sale of advertise-ments and extensive marketing

of the pirate service. The report pointed out that

there were deep-seated and fundamental flaws in Saudi Arabia’s commitment to pro-viding enforcement procedures consistent with the TRIPS Agreement, and Saudi Arabia has refused to take any effective criminal action against beoutQ despite being fully aware of the “extensive evidentiary basis for concluding that beoutQ is operated by individuals or entities subject to the criminal jurisdiction of Saudi Arabia.

Saudi Arabia has also restricted or otherwise frus-trated the ability of beIN (and its licensors) to pursue civil actions against the infringement of their IP rights, the report added. It further said that the authorities of the Saudi gov-ernment have “engaged in the promotion of public gatherings with screenings of beoutQ’s unauthorised broadcasts”, including of the 2018 World Cup. �P2

Qatar's economic performance ranks 6th globally in IMD competitiveness indexTHE PENINSULA — DOHA

Qatar has ranked sixth globally in economic performance, out of 63 countries that are mostly high-income countries, in The World Competitiveness Yearbook 2020. Qatar has ranked 14th in overall performance globally in the Yearbook, which is annually published by the International Institute for Management Development (IMD) located in Lausanne of Switzerland.

The results confirm Qatar’s strong performance across various fields. The ranking was based on national statistics as well as opinions of sample busi-nesses managers who provided their views of Qatar’s economy competitive climate.

Apart from economic per-formance, other areas, where Qatar ranked highly in the report, include, government efficiency (ranked 7) and business efficiency (ranked 11). Qatar has maintained 40th rank for infrastructure.

President of Planning & Sta-tistics Authority, H E Dr. Saleh bin Mohammed Al Nabit, welcomed the findings of the report, stating

that “these results confirm the solid overall performance and that the results will certainly help us to identify areas for further improvements”. H E added that “Qatar’s Second National Devel-opment Strategy 2018-2022, sets out clear goals in the areas of economic infrastructure and private sector development that will lead to economic and social growth.

Professor Christos Cabolis, Chief Economist, IMD World Competitiveness Center said, “Landing itself an impressive 14th place globally, Qatar has

proven to be impressively resilient to crises. As by the end of 2019 the global economy was already starting to look shaky, and although our rankings show that Qatar was among of the first to show tangible signs of this, compared to other econ-omies, Qatar quickly reacted. Something that resulted in dropping only in our short-term measurements, while ensuring long-term indicators such as health, education and business finance continued to improve in line with Qatar’s long-term trajectory.” �P2

Amir sends

condolences to

Amir of Kuwait

Amir H H Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani sent yesterday a cable of condo-lences to Amir of the State of Kuwait H H Sheikh Sabah Al Ahmad Al Jaber Al Sabah on the death of Sheikha Haya Abdullah Al Ali Al Malik Al Sabah.—QNA

Amir holds phone

call with King

of Morocco

FIFA has acknowledged the final panel report published by the World Trade Organisation (WTO) in relation to the activity of the pirate broadcaster known as ‘beoutQ’ and the active involvement and support that has been provided by Saudi Arabia (KSA) in the past three years.

In a statement posted on its website, FIFA said that it agrees with the WTO panel’s recommendations and demands that KSA takes the necessary steps in order that it conforms to its obli-gations under the Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) agreement with immediate effect in order to protect legitimate media rights partners, such as BeIN, and also football itself. The WTO panel’s recommendations are clear and piracy of football matches is an illegal activity and will not be tolerated on any level.

FIFA takes infringements of its intellectual property very seriously and is working in close partnership with FIFA licensees globally to combat such issues including illegal streaming and unauthorised broadcasts. FIFA will continue to collaborate with its various partners to minimise issues relating to the infringement of its rights both in the MENA region and glo-bally.—THE PENINSULA

FIFA acknowledges WTO reportUEFA, the Union of European Football Associations, has wel-comed the World Trade Organisation (WTO) report on piracy.

“UEFA welcomes the World Trade Organisation report and its conclusions. What is clear is that beoutQ’s broadcasts constitute piracy of UEFA’s matches and as such, are illegal. BeoutQ was hosted on frequencies transmitted by Arabsat and was promoted and carried out by individuals and entities subject to Saudi Arabia’s territorial jurisdiction,” said UEFA in a statement posted on its website.

It said that those seeking to follow beoutQ’s example should be in no doubt that UEFA will go to great lengths to protect its property and support its partners, whose investment in football helps it to remain the world’s most popular sport from grass-roots to elite level.

“Piracy not only threatens that investment but also the existence of professional sport as we know it. Today’s ruling shows clearly that no-one involved in audio-visual piracy should consider themselves above the rule of law,” it said.

—THE PENINSULA

UEFA welcomes report on piracy

Amir H H Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani held yesterday evening via tele-phone a conversation with H M King Mohammed VI of the sisterly Kingdom of Morocco, during which His Highness congratulated him on the successful surgery he underwent, praying to Almighty Allah to grant HM good health and the well-being.—QNA

In other areas, Qatar ranked highly in the report, including government efficiency (ranked 7th) and business efficiency (ranked 11th).

“This is a sign of a crisis resilient economy, especially in the face of a global downturn.

Saudi breached international law on protection of IP rights: OfficialTHE PENINSULA — DOHA

Dr. Mohammed Abdulaziz Al Khulaifi, Head of the Legal Team and representative from Qatar in International Court of Justice said the Dispute Settlement Body (DSB) at the World Trade Organisation (WTO) ruled clearly that Saudi Arabia breached its obligations under international law to protect Intellectual Property (IP) rights of Qatari company beIN Sports channels.

“We will monitor the imple-mentation of the judgement by Saudi Arabia during 60 days of the grace period or issuance of the decision to appeal against this verdict. If this case goes for appeal, Qatar will follow up procedures at WTO,” said Dr. Mohammed Abdulaziz Al Khu-laifi while talking in a program of Al Jazeera channel.

He said that if appeal is not made, Qatar will demand WTO with its monitoring and super-visory body to implement this

decision in coming days.“beIN Sports faced piracy

inside Saudi Arabia, this statement explained a number of facts in over 125 pages with evidence proving that this piracy took place in Saudi Arabia and through it to other countries of the world,” said Al Khulaifi.

He said that the report showed the breaches of intel-lectual property rights in Saudi Arabia supporting the pirates to broadcast illegally in Saudi market. �P3

Saudi Arabia has 60 days to implement the new decision or to appeal. It has two options, to implement the decision issued by World Trade Organisation during 60 days or to appeal, and Qatar will resort to all ways to obtain its rights in accordance with international law.”

Dr. Mohammed Abdulaziz Al Khulaifi

We expect Saudi Arabia, especially since it is hosting the upcoming G20, to respect this decisive ruling and end the theft and piracy of IP rights at once, said Qatar’s Minister of Commerce and Industry.

The WTO Panel found that Saudi Arabia’s failure to take criminal action against beoutQ was so disconnected from any legitimate security interest that it could not meet even “a minimum requirement of plausibility in relation to the proffered essential security interests”.

The report said that in addition to pirating beIN’s proprietary and licensed sports content, the beoutQ boxes allow access to thousands of pirated movies, TV shows, and TV channels from around the globe.

OFFICIAL NEWS

02 WEDNESDAY 17 JUNE 2020HOME

Deputy Amir sends condolences to Amir of Kuwait

DOHA: Deputy Amir H H Sheikh

Abdullah bin Hamad Al Thani sent

yesterday a cable of condolences

to the Amir of the State of Kuwait

H H Sheikh Sabah Al Ahmad Al

Jaber Al Sabah on the death of

Sheikha Haya Abdullah Al Ali Al

Malik Al Sabah. Prime Minister

and Minister of Interior, H E Sheikh

Khalid bin Khalifa bin Abdulaziz Al

Thani also sent yesterday a cable

of condolences to H H the Amir of

the State of Kuwait on the death

of Sheikha Haya Abdullah Al Ali

Al Malik Al Sabah. — QNA

FM receives phone call from Panama’s Foreign Minister

DOHA: Deputy Prime Minister

and Minister of Foreign Affairs, H E

Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrah-

man Al Thani received yesterday

a telephone call from the Minister

of Foreign Affairs of the Republic

of Panama, H E Alejandro Ferrer.

During the call, they reviewed

bilateral cooperation and rela-

tions and coordinated efforts to

curb the spread of the corona-

virus (COVID-19), and issues of

common interest. — QNA

FM receives phone call from Brazil Foreign Minister

DOHA: Deputy Prime Minister and

Minister of Foreign Affairs, H E

Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrah-

man Al Thani, received yesterday

a telephone call from the State

Minister of External Relations of

the Republic of Brazil, H E Ernesto

Araujo. During the call, they

reviewed bilateral cooperation,

relations and coordinated efforts

to curb the spread of the coronavi-

rus (COVID-19), besides issues of

common concern. — QNA

MME prepares draft national plan to combat desertificationTHE PENINSULA — DOHA

The Ministry of Municipality and the Environment (MME) has completed a draft national action plan to combat desertification, and work is underway to make the required amendments and updates to prepare it for approval.

This came in a statement issued by the MME yesterday on the occasion of World Day to Combat Desertification and Drought.

The State of Qatar, represented by the MME, has observed World Day to Combat Desertification and Drought which falls on June 17.

This global event aims at raising public awareness of international efforts to combat desertification. The Day is being mark this year under a theme ‘Food. Feed. Fibers’, and the rela-tionships between consumption and land.

The Ministry of Municipality and Environment, represented by the Envi-ronmental Affairs Sector, is making great efforts in the field combating desertification, through the implemen-tation of several programmes, initia-tives and projects related to preserving the vegetation and working to rehabil-itate Rawd (green areas) and cultivate wild plants.

These efforts included the plantation of 3,280 seedlings of wild plant as part

of the rehabilitation of the land in 2019, reallocation of 1,773 wild trees from the sites of infrastructure development projects, collecting seeds of wild plant in large quantities at the National Gene Bank and protecting rear and endan-gered specimens of trees and plants.

Minister of Municipality and Envi-ronment issued Ministerial Decision No. (180) for the year 2019 to extend the decision to ban camel grazing in the state for a period of two years, as this decision contributed in rehabilitating some postur lands.

It is noticed that the decision on banning camel grazing helped in growing a number of wild trees like

Samur, Al Sulam, Al Sidr, Al Awasaj and reduce negative impact of over grazing on the wild vegetation.

The Minister of Municipality and Environment also issued decision No. (381) of 2018 to form a permanent working group to study the positive and negative effects of the decision of banning grazing on vegetation and the camel herd.

The team includes eight depart-ments - Protection and Wildlife, Natural Reserves, Livestock, Legal Affairs, Agri-cultural Research, Public Parks, Agri-cultural Affairs Department, and the Geographic Information Systems Center.

A working group was also formed to update the national strategy to combat desertification in accordance with Min-isterial Decision No. 373 of 2017.

Within the framework of protecting

and rehabilitating Rawd (green areas), so far 16 Rawd were fenced in various parts of the country, some of which were completely closed for protecting some of the threatened and extinct specimens of trees in the country, while others have been partially closed to protect them from the threat.

The Rawd which were completely closed for protecting endangered spec-imens of trees are Rawat Ghafat Makin in Al Shamal, Ghafat Rawdat Rashid, Rawdat Al Babar in the North of Al Aturiya. The Rawd that were partially closed are Rawdat Laouina in Al Nas-raniya, Rawdat Al-Saij in Umm Taqah, Rawdat Semsema in Semaisima Dis-trict, Rawdat Wadi Ethanah in Asa Al-Raee, Rawdat Al Hasham in the area of Hawilah, Rawdat Falihah in Fuwairot, Rawdat Markiya Al Darb on Salwa Road.

A general view of a green belt rehabilitated by MME.

Minister receives phone call from German Minister of State

DOHA: Minister of State for For-

eign Affairs, H E Sultan bin Saad

Al Muraikhi received yesterday a

phone call from the Minister of

State at the Federal Foreign Office

of Germany H E Niels Annen. Dur-

ing the phone call, the two sides

reviewed the bilateral cooperation,

as well as issues of common con-

cern. — QNA

Doha’s art scene vibrant despite COVID-19RAYNALD C RIVERA THE PENINSULA

The vibrancy of Doha’s art scene is very much evident despite COVID-19 as galleries put up virtual exhibitions featuring Qatari and Arab artists, most recent of which is Al Markhiya Gallery.

Al Markhiya Gallery, Doha’s oldest privately owned art gallery, has announced via social media that it would launch an online edition of its signature 50 x 50 exhibition.

This is the first virtual exhibition for the biannual show which marks its seventh edition. The exhibition will be accessible on the gallery’s official website, it said.

The virtual group exhibition features works by 14 artists including Ahmed Al Haddad, Ahmed Sultan, Aisha Al-Sowaidi, Ali Al-Naama, Hadeer Omar, Khalifa Al Marri, Lina Al-Aali, Manar Al Muftah, Maryam Al Mousa, Moza Al Kuwari, Mubarak Al Malik, Noor Qussini, Wurood Azzam and Zeina Abbara.

Launched in June 2017, Al Markhiya

Gallery’s ‘50x50’ series has been pro-viding an effective platform for artists here to reach out to more audiences by producing artworks in various mediums and diverse themes on 50cm by 50cm size canvases making it possible for art collectors to acquire original artworks by established artists at affordable cost.

Al Markhiya Gallery is also currently running another online exhibition on its Artsy page called “Reformat” featuring Reformat works by Hamza Bounoua, “an Algerian visual artist whose multi-dis-ciplinary practice negotiates between his Islamic, Arabic heritage and contem-porary aesthetics of representation.”

It follows the success of Qatari artist Mubarak Al Thani’s “Social Distancing” and Palestinian artist Hayyan Monawar’s “Heroes of the Experiment,” both on Artsy.

A pioneering private art gallery in Doha, Al Markhiya Gallery continues its mission promoting, exhibiting and selling Qatari and Arab contemporary art.

It is known for its flagship event ’40 Minus’ which is an annual exhibition that

seeks to promote emerging artists under the age of 40.

Prior to the pandemic, Al Markhiya Gallery has regularly presented exhibi-tions in both of its galleries located in Katara Art Centre and Doha Fire Station.

Meanwhile, the Cultural Village Foun-dation - Katara is presently running three virtual exhibitions on its website namely “Culture Collision” by Hassan Taleb Alsalat, “The Result” by Fatima Al Nuaimi, and “Al Taybeen” by Ali Dasmal Al Kuwari.

The National Museum of Qatar (NMoQ) also recently announced that it would soon launch four virtual exhibitions in various themes including NMoQ Creates Together, Habitats and Shelter, Qatar’s Culinary Journey, and Mal Lawal.

The NMoQ, the Musuem of Islamic Art, Mathaf: Arab Museum of Modern Art, Fire Station Artist in Residence, 3-2-1 Qatar Olympic and Sports Museum, and Qatar Children’s Museums also actively engage the public through their own online initi-atives in the form of unique and engaging activities catered to various ages and interests.

MoCI welcomes

WTO ruling against

Saudi violations of

IP rights

FROM PAGE 1

The Panel’s analysis shows how, by allowing beoutQ’s theft and piracy to spread unchecked for several years, Saudi Arabia has actively vio-lated its obligations under the TRIPS Agreement to protect the IP rights of Qatari nationals and of high-profile sports and entertainment rights holders from other trading partners, including the United States, the European Union, and the United Kingdom. This is despite complaints by govern-ments around the world, as well as by some of the highest-profile sports leagues and media companies around the globe.

Under this ruling, Saudi Arabia must now heed the WTO Panel’s call to stop its abuse of valuable IP rights, and “bring its measures into con-formity with its obligations under the TRIPS Agreement”.

While the dispute before the WTO Panel focused on IP-related violations, the Panel’s findings also highlighted Saudi Arabia’s human rights viola-tions directed at Qataris.

The Panel found that Saudi Arabia “expelled Qatari resi-dents and visitors in Saudi ter-ritories” with only two weeks’ notice — for no reason other than that they were Qatari — and imposed restrictions pre-venting Qataris from travelling to, or transiting through, Saudi territory.

Moreover, the Panel high-lighted that these discrimi-natory measures were man-dated by the Saudi gov-ernment, finding “the existence of the general anti sympathy measures that directly or indirectly fostered a climate of anti-sympathy against Qatar and Qatari nationals”.

It is worth noting that Qatar has initiated several other legal proceedings before the WTO, and other international courts and tribunals, in respect of unlawful actions taken by Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, and Egypt, since June 2017. Qatar will con-tinue to pursue justice through these legal actions, while hon-oring its own international law obligations. During the session, several WTO Members inter-vened before the Panel as third parties, supporting aspects of Qatar’s position. In this context, the European Union empha-sized that, consistent with the WTO obligations, “criminal procedures and penalties should not be provided only on paper, but should be effective in practice”.

Qatar’s economic

performance

ranks 6th in IMD

competitiveness

index

FROM PAGE 1

“This is a sign of a crisis resilient economy, especially in the face of a global downturn. We expect Qatar to be one of the first to rebound from the current global situation,” he said.

Qatar’s rank has been positively influenced by many factors including strong economic performance as represented by, Qatar’s low unemployment rate (ranked first), high percentage of gross fixed capital formation, capital investments, and saving to GDP (ranked first for all three), percentage of trade balance to GDP (ranked first), the high overall pro-ductivity (ranked first) and low inflation rate (ranked third). Other factors nega-tively influenced the rank as real GDP growth per capita (rank 58), Office rents (rank 52), Business expenditure on R&D percent (rank 57).

Qatar’s competitiveness assessment in IMD World Competitiveness Yearbook 2020 is a collaborative effort between International Institute for Management Development and Planning and Statistics Authority. The State of Qatar has con-tributed to the IMD Compet-itiveness Yearbook for the 12th time.

Premier League returns exclusively on beIN Sports

THE PENINSULA DOHA

beIN Sports, the global sports channel, is set to welcome the return of the English Premier League today, with a host of much-anticipated live games for viewers to enjoy exclusively across the Middle East and North Africa (MENA), as well as the chance to watch Mohamed Salah’s Liverpool clinch their first ever Premier League trophy.

The Premier League is the third major European football competition after Germany’s Bundesliga and Spain’s LaLiga to take extremely careful and calculated measures to resume following the COVID-19 outbreak.

With these three major European football leagues back in action, beIN Sports will broadcast an incredible 400 live football games in just 80 days – more than any other sports broadcaster on the planet – with live coverage and dedi-cated studios across its channels in MENA.

beIN Sports’ main studio coverage for the Premier League will be on beIN Sports HD1 and HD2 for Arabic; beIN

Sports HD11 for English; as well as beIN Sports’ 4K channel – providing viewers with exhila-rating bilingual coverage.

The state-of-the-art Arabic and English studios surrounding every match day will also provide in depth analysis, team news, statistics, and interviews – as each game will be available with an option for enhanced crowd atmosphere. beIN Sports will also have presence at key matches – making use of the most advanced remote tech-nology to give the viewer a closer perspective directly from the stadiums.

beIN guests, presenters and talent for this week’s Premier League will include Egyptian legends Mohamed Aboutrika, Qatari star Mohamed Saadon Al Kuwari; Tunisian football legend Hatem Trabelsi and many others.

Liverpool holds a 25-point lead at the top of the table as Jurgen Klopp’s men await for their first ever Premier League trophy and 19th English league title. The Reds need two wins to secure the long-awaited title as they face local rivals Everton

in their first match on Sunday .Second place Manchester

City will be looking to win all their remaining matches and hope for a slip up from Liv-erpool to close down the gap. Star players Sergio Aguero, Kevin De Bruyne and Raheem Sterling are all fit and ready to play their first game back against Mikel Arteta’s Arsenal today.

With Liverpool and Man-chester City comfortably in first and second place, the race for the remaining UEFA Champions League places are up for grabs as Tottenham Hotspur, Chelsea, Leicester City, Manchester United, Wolverhampton Wan-derers, Sheffield United and Arsenal all competing for third and fourth place.

5th placed Manchester United go to 8th placed Tot-tenham Hotspur for matchday 30 of the Premier League on Friday 19 June as both teams look to close the gap on Chelsea who are in 4th place with 48 points. The blues travel to Aston Villa on June 21.

Commenting on the return of the Premier League on beIN

Sports, Jonathan Whitehead, Head of Sports for beIN MENA, said: “We are delighted to welcome back the Premier League to our channels, espe-cially as this season’s run-in is set to be one of the most enjoyable in recent history – with Mohamed Salah set to lift his first Premier League trophy with Liverpool within weeks; the battle for Champions League places incredibly close and exciting; and the fight to beat rel-egation going down to the wire and still left undecided. With the Bundesliga, LaLiga and the Premier League – beIN Sports will broadcast around 400 games in just 80 days, with never seen before coverage including dedicated studios and beIN guests and legends. Our Premier League coverage will also include commentary in English and Arabic as well as games on our state-of-the-art beIN 4K channel, so that you can see Mohamed Salah’s Liverpool, Sergio Aguero’s Manchester City, Paul Pogba’s Manchester United, and the other thrilling teams in the highest quality.”

With the return of major football competitions including the Premier League, FA Cup, LaLiga, Bundesliga, and The Championship in the space of 80 days – beIN SPORTS will broadcast in the region of 400 live games – an average of 5 premium matches per day.

beIN entertains and operates in 43 countries globally, including 24 countries across the MENA region. With broadcast on satellite in 4K and Full HD, the beIN experience is also available on mobile, tablet, computer and other home devices through beIN CONNECT.

The Ministry of Municipality and Environment is making efforts to combat desertification, through the implementation of several programmes, initiatives and projects related to preserving the vegetation and working to rehabilitate green areas and cultivate wild plants.

beIN Sports’ main studio coverage for the Premier League will be on beIN Sports HD1 and HD2 for Arabic; beIN Sports HD11 for English; as well as beIN Sports’ 4K channel.

03WEDNESDAY 17 JUNE 2020 HOME

Telecom companies maintaining high service standards: CRATHE PENINSULA — DOHA

The Communications Regulatory Authority (CRA) published yesterday on its website a summary of an extensive audit of mobile networks in Qatar that was conducted from September to December 2019.

The CRA conducted this annual audit with a view to ensure that the quality of mobile voice and data services are consistent with the Key Performance Indicators (KPI) required to be provided to the consumers in Qatar by the telecom service providers — Ooredoo Qatar and Vodafone Qatar — and that quality of mobile services are in line with the applicable regu-latory framework and the terms and conditions of the licenses granted by the CRA to the service providers.

This kind of annual audit helps in assessing the improvements of the quality of mobile service levels offered by the service providers in Qatar. The measurement methodology of the last year network audit included testing samples that were collected from dif-ferent areas in Qatar during the peak hours of working days.

Measurements covered main roads and highways, major pedestrian areas as well as several indoor locations. For that purpose, the CRA used its Quality of Service (QoS) systems, which are considered as most advanced systems in the region, in addition to the latest versions of devices and smartphones,

to obtain results that reflect the con-sumers’ experience in the mobile services in Qatar.

“In continuation of CRA’s efforts to ensure that the consumers in Qatar have access to reliable and high-quality services, the CRA published its annual report after a series of analysis and verification of all data collected during the field measure-ments, and after being processed and extensively discussed with the service providers. Last year audit results indicate that the service providers continue in maintaining the high standards of accessibility, retaina-bility and integrity of the services offered to its consumers and in improving their capability to provide higher data throughputs from the year before. As a result, we witnessed

during this year a high-level per-formance of telecom networks, espe-cially during the previous period associated with the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19),” said Mohammed Ali Al Mannai, President of CRA.

“Since the CRA was established in 2014, the CRA keeps on developing proper regulatory instruments to ensure the development of highest standard mobile and fixed telecom networks and infrastructures, which the same contributes to fostering the development of the telecom sector and the provision of high-quality telecom services for all the consumers in Qatar. To this end, the CRA contin-uously monitors service providers compliance with respect to the terms and conditions of their licenses as well

as with the applicable regulatory framework. I would like to thank the telecom service providers for their efforts in adopting new technologies and constantly modernising their net-works, to ensure providing the con-sumers in Qatar with advanced, reliable and high-quality services,” he added.

CRA affirmed after publishing the summary results of the extensive QoS audit that the purpose of the audit was not to identify the best network or do a comparison between the service providers in Qatar. The CRA empha-sised that the audit’s findings should not be used for any purpose that does not serve the required value of the report, such as promoting the best service provider or taking a part or parts of the report to be used in a way that it may abuse another service

provider, or to use the audit’s findings in a way that may be misleading or inaccurate considering the scope of the audit.

It is worth to mention that the CRA is actively engaged in developing a forward-looking and customer-ori-ented QoS framework.

In January 2020, the CRA pub-lished a public consultation to receive views and comments from stake-holders; consumers and telecom service providers, on the draft of this new QoS framework, including meas-urement methodologies and KPIs which are in line with international standards and best practices. Also, the CRA is now assessing the responses in view of a final draft of the future Regulation which will replace the existing service providers’ license obligations.

Qatar’s envoy praises strong Qatar-Azerbaijan tiesQNA — DOHA

Ambassador of the State of Qatar to the Republic of Azerbaijan, H E Faisal bin Abdullah Al Hanzab, has commended the depth and distinction of bilateral relations between Doha and Baku.

In an interview with Eurasia Diary, H E the Ambassador said that there is a great mutual desire from the leadership of the two countries to develop and strengthen bilateral rela-tions in all fields, especially in the economic, commercial and investment aspects, noting the establishment of the Joint Eco-nomic, Trade and Technical Commission between the Gov-ernment of the State of Qatar and the Government of the Republic of Azerbaijan to explore existing opportunities

and hold regular meetings to achieve the set goals.

“We believe that this desire will end with the realisation of common interests and the increase of trade and investment turnover between the countries. In particular, both countries are trying to diversify their economies which are largely based on the oil and gas industry, and prices in this area cannot always be controlled by the international situation,” H E Al Hanzab added.

“Diplomatic relations between the State of Qatar and the Republic of Azerbaijan were established in 1994. These rela-tions are based on the friendly relations of both countries, based on the principles and goals of strengthening international peace and stability and common interests as an active member of

the UN and the international community.” the Ambassador noted.

On the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, H E the Ambassador said that the pan-demic has had a great impact on all countries of the world and aspects of life as it has great repercussions on the global economy, and drained the resources of governments in light of the decline in economic growth and the decline in oil prices due to the lack of demand, therefore, its effects are

prohibitive on most sectors, especially aviation and tourism.

He said that the State of Qatar, as most of the countries of the world, was affected by the COVID-19 pandemic, and has tightened precautionary measures with the provision of distinguished medical care.

He pointed out that the State has adopted a strategic plan to contain the virus, focusing on tracking contacts with patients and isolating them, conducting tests and providing the necessary

treatment within the process of breaking the chain of trans-mission of the disease, which helped protect lives and lower death rates compared to other countries of the world.

H E Ambassador Al Hanzab pointed out that the State of Qatar has sent urgent medical assistance to many brotherly and friendly countries, out of its international responsibility and in support of joint efforts to counter the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, pointing to the remarkable efforts of the Government of Azerbaijan to support countries and interna-tional organisations and also provide humanitarian assistance to more than 13 countries around the world, in addition to the financial donation to the World Health Organiszation.

H E Faisal bin Abdullah Al

Hanzab said, “Azerbaijan is an ancient country where different cultures and civilizations meet, with a completely different geo-graphical position. Also, the fact that the population of Azerbaijan throughout the country, as well as those who live here live in peace and stability, is one of the main indicators in attracting tourists, in addition to the great potential of the country in terms of tourism infrastructure and logistics.”

“I think that after the con-sequences of the coronavirus pandemic are eliminated and the world gets rid of it, Azerbaijan will pay more attention to the tourism sector, given the diversity of nature, geographical location, and favourable condi-tions, which is an important factor for tourism development,” H E the Ambassador added.

There is a great mutual desire from the leadership of the two countries to develop and strengthen

bilateral relations in all fields, especially in the economic, commercial and investment aspects.

I would like to thank the telecom service providers for their

efforts in adopting new technologies and constantly modernising their networks, to ensure providing the consumers in Qatar with advanced, reliable and high-quality services.Mohammed Ali Al Mannai,

President of CRA

Plan ready to manage traffic during easing of restrictions: OfficialTHE PENINSULA — DOHA

The General Directorate of Traffic has developed an inte-grated plan for traffic patrols during the implementation of the first phase of the gradual lifting of restrictions imposed to limit the spread of COVID-19.

Captain Omar Mubarak Al Hajri, Patrols and Traffic Investigations Officer at the General Directorate of Traffic, said that traffic patrols during the coming period will be spread in the internal and external roads in all regions of the country, especially roads which have more traffic.

Captain Al Hajri pointed out that the patrols will be

constantly present in the malls, and commercial streets to control the movement of vehicles, in addition to deploy more patrols at intersections, in order to ease traffic jams.

The Patrols and Traffic Investigations Section at the Department works around the clock to receive public complaints, and to provide support to motorists in emer-gency cases on the roads in a manner that guarantees the safety of all road users, and the smooth flow of traffic, he said.

He added that the traffic plan included the presence of more patrols during peak hours when traffic become heavy. Al Hajri stressed that the Department uses all its

capabilities and follows-up and implements all decisions issued by the concerned authorities in the country to l imit the spread of COVID-19.

He also urged all road users to cooperate with the patrols to facilitate their tasks, also to commit to speed-limits, avoid wrong traffic behaviour, and adhere to traffic rules. People should adhere to preventive measures announced by the concerned authorities during the implementation of the first phase of the gradual lifting of restrictions imposed as a result of the outbreak of COVID-19, because this is will support the country’s efforts to limit the spread of the virus.

MoPH: Over 60,000 patients recoverQNA — DOHA

The Ministry of Public Health (MoPH) announced yesterday 1,201 new confirmed cases of COVID-19 and 1,780 new recoveries in the last 24 hours, bringing the total number of recoveries in Qatar to 60,461. The Ministry also announced four deaths due to the virus.

The MoPH said in a statement that during the last 24 hours, 19 new cases have been admitted to intensive care due to health complications from Covid-19, bringing the total number of cases currently in intensive care to 244.

The Ministry said that the individuals infected contracted the virus from other infected people, adding that proactive testing contributes to early detection of cases.

The confirmed cases were admitted into quarantine in the various medical facilities in the country, where they receive the necessary health care according to the health status of each case.

The MoPH said that the deaths recorded yesterday were of two patients aged 61 years, and two aged 43 and 53 years, and were receiving medical care in intensive care units. The ministry offered sincere con-dolences and great sympathy to the families of the deceased.

The MoPH confirmed that efforts to tackle the COVID-19 virus in Qatar have succeeded in flattening the curve and reducing the impact of the virus greatly thanks to the preventive measures taken, and the awareness and cooperation of all members of society. It added that there are relatively low average numbers in relation to the recorded cases of

new hospital admissions. The Ministry said Qatar has now started to overcome the peak phase of the COVID-19 out-break thanks to the measures taken by the State, along with the commitment of the com-munity members to the recom-mendations and preventive instructions, the most important of which are social distancing and staying at home and not going out except for necessity as well as using medical masks.

Anyone with symptoms of COVID-19 should either quickly contact the 16000 helpline or go directly to one of the desig-nated health centers for testing, the ministry said emphasizing that the earlier the disease is detected the easier it will be to receive the right treatment and recover. The main screening centers include Muaither Health Centre, Rawdat Al Khail Health Centre, Umm Slal Health Centre and Al Gharafa Health Centre.

The MoPH reaffirmed the necessity for the elderly or those suffering from chronic diseases and their family members to follow strict methods and precautions to reduce the risk of infection and work to protect them from infection by refraining from social visits, wearing the mask and cleansing the hands when near them.

The ministry said that the State of Qatar began on Monday lifting the restrictions imposed to combat the epidemic grad-ually in four stages that will last until September 1, based on the extensive data and studies con-ducted by the concerned authorities in the country.

In this context, it is stressed that the application of pre-ventive measures and must

continue in the stages of grad-ually lifting the imposed restric-tions that were applied in the country as a result of the spread of the COVID-19, as failure to adhere to precautionary measures during the next stage will lead to the return of the virus to the country.

The MOPH stressed that the gradual lifting of restrictions came after a thorough study of the situation in Qatar and from similar experiences in many countries that have succeeded in limiting the spread of the virus after gradually lifting the restrictions.

The ministry warned that lifting the restrictions gradually does not mean the disap-pearance of COVID-19, pointing out that during the planning of the relaxation of restrictions, attention was given to priorities to ensure avoiding the risks that may arise as a result of lifting them. Each stage will be subject to evaluation and review based on the extent of the virus spread as the success of each stage depends on the commitment of everyone to implement the required precautions.

The MOPH also stressed that the COVID-19 pandemic that swept the world posed a great challenge to all countries and affected each country in a different way. Therefore, it is important to realize that all the precautionary measures are aimed at primarily to protecting public health and individuals from this virus, taking into account all other aspects of life, whether social or economic.

The MOPH also recom-mended visiting its website reg-ularly to view the latest infor-mation and instructions related to COVID-19.

Saudi breached international law on

protection of IP rights: OfficialFROM PAGE 1

The major event broadcast illegally by beoutQ was the opening ceremony of 2018 World Cup and a number of matches among many more.

Saudi Arabia must protect intellectual property rights in accordance with the agreement that Saudi Arabia ratified in 2005.

“Saudi Arabia has 60 days to implement the new decision or to appeal. It has two options, to implement the decision issued by World Trade Organisation during 60 days or to appeal, and Qatar will resort to all ways to obtain its rights in accordance with interna-tional law,” he said.

He also said: “We know that this issue is part of a number of cases and violations com-mitted by Saudi Arabia. Other blockading coun-tries have also committed many violations

against Qatar. There are matters related to the commercial aspect, aviation and human rights.”

It is a historic decision for the World Trade Organisation in nearly 73 years since it was founded, he added.

A trade organisation is an international organisation concerned with controlling and monitoring freedom of trade and business, including intellectual property rights related to business operations.

“During the hearings, Saudi Arabia tried to adhere to the exceptions related to the issue of ‘national security exception in Article 73’, and in such case the country may not commit and apply all obligations which has signed,” he said.

However, the organisation considered these standards do not apply to Saudi Arabia case.

04 WEDNESDAY 17 JUNE 2020HOME

Daam supports QCS to treat cancer patientsTHE PENINSULA — DOHA

The Social and Sport Contri-bution Fund (Daam) has supported Qatar Cancer Society (QCS) to aid with the medical expenses of patients who are unable to cover their treatment costs. This comes within a recent support agreement between the two entities.

The agreement aims to highlight the importance of the joint efforts to serve the com-munity and fight cancer, and in line with Qatar National Vision (QNV) 2030 to focus on the human factor and invest in human health.

Dr Sheikh Khaled bin Jabor Al Thani, Chairman of QCS, thanked the Social and Sport Contribution Fund (Daam) for the kind gesture of supporting the Society, whether in the field of patient treatment or cancer awareness, given that this ini-tiative is not the first for Daam to support the Society, pointing to the previous cooperation between the two parties in raising public awareness of cancer, ways to prevent it and importance of early detection.

He affirmed that QCS will continue the efforts to achieve its vision to be the community partnership platform for making Qatar a leader in cancer prevention and its burden control, as well as its mission to achieve its goals through working with its partners to educate the com-munity and support, empower and advocate for individuals living with cancer.

He wished that all institu-tions join hands to spread awareness of the disease, as well as provide support — both

material and moral — to people living with the disease.

Chairman of Daam expressed his pleasure to have signed the agreement — and on behalf of the members of the Board of Directors — and said, “We are proud to contribute to such a vital cause, carrying out our responsibility towards our community. This agreement is beneficial to cancer patients in Qatar, who need support, spe-cially in the situation arising from the COVID-19 pandemic. We all have seen the efforts exerted by the State to respond to the situation, and we all should be there to help.”

“In accordance with QNV 2030, our strategic framework focuses on the social sector in Qatar among other sectors, and we are translating this focus into initiatives as such, which target diversified groups in the society. This is not our first cooperation with QCS, as we foster a strategic and sus-tainable pattern in our relations with entities that share our goals and values.”

Dr. Dera Al Dosari, Director of Resources Development Department at QCS, thanked the Social and Sport Contri-bution Fund (Daam) for con-tributing to the treatment expenses of patients especially with the high costs of treatment, noting the impor-tance of joining efforts to fight against cancer. “The last period witnessed a remarkable devel-opment of QCS until it became one of the pioneering societies in this field, in light of the pres-idency of Sheikh Dr. Khalid bin Jabr Al Thani, who is doing his best to further improve it,” he added.

Qatar Charity inks pacts with global organisations to fight COVID-19

THE PENINSULA — DOHA

Qatar Charity (QC), since the outbreak of the coronavirus (COVID-19) epidemic, has signed various cooperation agreements with several inter-national organisations, including the United Nations Children’s Fund (Unicef) and the United Nations High Commis-sioner for Refugees (UNHCR), to contribute to the global efforts to limit the spread of the virus in many countries and provide emergency assistance to those affected.

This aims at reaching out to the largest number of benefici-aries and improving their living conditions.

Qatar Charity, in cooperation with UNHCR, began providing emergency assistance to Syrian refugees throughout Lebanon in response to the humanitarian needs resulting from the spread of the coronavirus epidemic, as

part of the $1.5m cooperation agreement signed between two parties.

This cooperation enables Qatar Charity to provide support in various forms for programmes focused on improving the living conditions of refugees during this difficult time.

Under the cooperation with the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), Qatar Charity (QC) has started to establish 14 community-based isolation units in northern Syria to benefit 2,800 people of camps at a total cost of $1.6m.

The initiative came as part of the urgent response to the outbreak of the coronavirus (COVID-19), aiming at pro-tecting the internally-displaced Syrians living in camps from the virus. OCHA contributed to the project a total of $830,000, while Qatar Charity will equip these medical and non-medical units with a value of $770,000.

Qatar Charity and Unicef

have signed two grant agree-ments for a total of $2m to address the humanitarian needs caused by the spread of the coronavirus (COVID-19) out-break in Syria and Jordan. $1m was allocated to provide water, sanitation and hygiene services for Syrian refugees in Jordan and an additional $1m to support Unicef’s efforts to improve COVID-19 prepar-edness and response in Syria.

The two agreements reflect the commitment of Qatar Charity and Unicef to teamwork and partnerships in the human-itarian sector, which are more important than ever to protect the vulnerable.

The cooperation between Qatar Charity and Unicef also included awareness-raising efforts against the risks of the coronavirus. Qatar Charity, in co-operation with Unicef, launched a social media awareness campaign for children, their families and members of the society to enhance their protection

against the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) and reduce the spread of the virus.

The campaign implemented under a slogan, which literally means “Heroes in the Face of Corona”, includes publishing illustrated awareness brochures and pamphlets on Qatar Char-ity’s website and social media accounts to encourage children and adolescents to adhere to preventive behaviours and pre-cautionary measures.

It is noteworthy that the agreements with international organisations are in line with Qatar Charity’s coronavirus Prevention and Response Plan to support and scale up vul-nerable countries’ preparedness and response efforts. In the beginning of March, Qatar Charity urgently scaled up relief efforts across 27 countries where it is supporting local gov-ernments’ efforts by mitigating the socio-economic impacts of the measures taken by these countries to curb the spread of the virus.

Volunteers of Qatar Charity delivering aid.

Student honors announced at Qatar Foundation partner NU-QTHE PENINSULA — DOHA

Northwestern University will hold its 162nd commencement on June 19 for its 12 schools, including NU-Q. Alongside the commencement ceremony, NU-Q has announced this year’s valedictorian and Latin Honor recipients.

At Northwestern’s com-mencement, NU-Q graduates will have their bachelor’s degrees from the Medill School of Journalism, Media, Integrated Marketing Communications, and the School of Communi-cation conferred at a virtual ceremony that will include Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot as the featured speaker.

“As we prepare for North-western’s commencement cer-emony, we highlight several students with academic achievements that deserve to

be recognized. These students not only hold an enviable record of academic distinction but also demonstrate the highest level of leadership,” said Craig LaMay, acting dean of NU-Q.

Latin Honors — designated at summa, magna, and cum laude — date back to the 19th century and are commonly used in American universities to rec-ognize students of the highest academic distinction. The class valedictorian is traditionally the student with the highest ranking.

This year, the highest-ranking students are also the c l a s s v a l e d i c t o r i a n s . Muhammad Humam and Ayza Sheikh were tied in the ranking, and along with being designated as summa cum laude graduates, they were also named class valedictorians.

Four of this year’s graduates

received the magna cum laude recognition. Maha Essid, Malek Al Manaa, Sahar Ahmed ElKabash, and Sarah Shaath were recognized in a category that typically represents

students in the top 10 percent of their graduating class.

Aimen Ahmed Jan, Fareehan Salah Zaki Moustafa Elgakhlab, Muhammad Muneeb Ur Rehman, Noor Mazen

Abdulqader Abunaba’a, Sana Zehra, and Sara Hamad KH. H. Al Thani graduated with the cum laude distinction, which typically represents the top 25 percent of their class.

The class of 2020 will join a worldwide network of more than 200,000 Northwestern alumni. Graduates of NU-Q hold positions with leading organi-zations in the region, including Al Jazeera Media Network, Qatar’s Government Communi-cations Office, Qatar Media Cor-poration, Amiri Diwan, Doha Film Institute, Qatar Museums, Hamad Medical Corporation, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Supreme Committee for Delivery and Legacy (Qatar World Cup 2022), Qatar Airways, Qatar Foundation, Ras Gas, and Total Energy and Petroleum.

In addition, 25 percent of NU-Q graduates pursue graduate degrees at leading uni-versities, including Harvard, Oxford, Cambridge, Cornell, New York University, North-western, and the London School of Economics, among others.

Members of the NU-Q Class of 2020.

QC, in cooperation with UNHCR, is providing emergency assistance to Syrian refugees throughout Lebanon in response to the humanitarian needs resulting from the spread of the coronavirus epidemic, as part of the $1.5m cooperation agreement signed between two parties.

RACA workshop

discusses standards

for non-profit

organisationsQNA — DOHA

The Regulatory Authority for Charitable Activities (RACA) organised a training workshop on the most important international standards in the field of governance, transparency and financial integrity of non-profit organisations.

Entitled “Enhancing the obli-gations of governance, trans-parency and financial integrity of non-profit organizations”, the workshop, which was held remotely, introduced the national legal system in the field of gov-ernance, transparency, financial integrity of non-profit organisa-tions, as well as governance and its relationship to the goals of sus-tainable development and social responsibility.

The workshop called on non-profit organisations to adhere to the controls and procedures stipulated in the integrity and transparency rules and instructions issued by the RACA in accordance with Article “32 bis” of the Charity Organization Law.

RACA is a governmental body that aims to develop, encourage, supervise and monitor charitable work within the framework of the state’s general policy.

Temporary closure on Al Luqta Street main roadTHE PENINSULA — DOHA

The Public Works Authority ‘ A s h g h a l ’ a n n o u n c e d yesterday a temporary closure on Al Luqta Street main road from the Tilted Interchange to Gharrafat Al Rayyan Inter-change, over two phases, during which the traffic will be diverted to the service roads. The road from Doha to Dukhan will be closed starting June 19, until July 3, and the

road from Dukhan to Doha will be closed from July 3 until July 17. This closure which is in coordination with the General Directorate of Traffic is to enable the asphalt works, as part of Khalifa Avenue Project.

The Public Works Authority will install road signs advising motorists of the closure and requests all road users to abide by the existing speed limit and follow the road signs to ensure their safety.

QRCS supports Palestine Red Crescent hospital

THE PENINSULA — DOHA

Qatar Red Crescent Society (QRCS) is about to complete a project to renovate and furnish the department of operations and sterilization at the Palestine Red Crescent Soci-ety’s (PRCS) Hospital — Al-Quds Branch.

With a total budget of $511,300 (QR1.87m), the project was initiated in 2018, and it is now 85 percent com-plete. The project involves renovating the department of operations and sterilization, reconstructing the power system, installing an elevator connecting the operations and sterilization units, and pro-viding the operations unit with medical equipment to be used in surgeries.

This includes operating light, operating table, stretcher,

patient bed, vital signs monitor, suction machine, reverse osmosis (RO) system for central sterile services department (CSSD), anaes-thesia trolley, CR Machine, fluid warmer, and mayo table.

With a total of 12,000 ben-eficiaries per year, the project is a major one implemented by QRCS’s representation office in Al-Quds. It is aimed at improving the hospital’s capacity to provide essential health services for the people of Al-Quds.

Once complete, the project will help the hospital to obtain licensing, as the operations department had not been ren-ovated since 1985.

Both QRCS and PRCS are working together on the project, in order to develop the hospital’s performance, meet the applicable quality

standards, alleviate the suf-fering the Palestinian citizens, and reduce the need to travel to other countries for health care.

Established in 1953, the PRCS’s hospital in Al-Quds is a leading health care provider in the field of obstetrics and gynaecology, performing 1,000 surgeries per month and 3,500 deliveries per year. It has a capacity of 40 beds, two outpatient clinics, ambulance and emergency department, and volunteers department.

The hospital is holder of ISO 9001:2008 and the Joint Commission International (JCI) accreditation. With 250 staff, it has a preterm baby intensive care unit (ICU), as well as the city’s only ambulance and emergency department managed by a National Society.

QRCS official at the operations department of the Palestine Red Crescent Society hospital, Al-Quds Branch. RIGHT: Electric panels installed as part of the hospital's renovation project.

05WEDNESDAY 17 JUNE 2020 HOME

Qatari Forum for Authors organises

training on psychological flexibilityQNA — DOHA

The Qatari Forum for Authors, in cooperation with the Department of Family Affairs of the Ministry of Administrative Development, Labour and Social Affairs, organized, via Microsoft Teams, a training course on Psychological Flexibility.

Delivered by Consultant psy-chiatrist and cognitive behavioral therapist, Dr. Khalid Ahmed Abdul-gabbar, the training tackled the topic of psychological flexibility of health practitioners and caregivers, as it is also important for all members of the society during crises.

Dr. Abdulgabbar emphasized the importance of the mental health of the individual and society during crises being as important as physical health, and its great role in improving the quality of life, reducing the dangers of psychological and pro-fessional combustion and improving the productivity of the individual and the quality of work. He also stressed the health prac-titioners need for mental health to develop themselves and their ability to face life challenges.

He also pointed out that

Psychological Flexibility requires committing to several conditions, which include knowing and applying values; acceptance and commitment; cognitive and behavioral correction; mature defense mechanisms; relationship management and building strong and enduring relationships in addition to collective work and expanding relationship spaces.

Cognitive behavioral therapy is the most effective form of psy-chotherapy, which has been proven by research and studies in a variety of mental disorders, said Dr. Abdulgabbar adding that its therapeutic techniques have been used to guide and provide psychological support to those who need it.

It is worth mentioning that this training is the sixth of its kind in the framework of cooperation between the Qatari Forum for Authors and the Department of Family Affairs. Psychological Flexibility is the ability to stay in contact with the present moment regardless of unpleasant thoughts, feelings, and bodily sensations, while choosing one’s behaviors based on the situation and personal values.

Registration opens for collaborative coursewith QF partners Georgetown, HBKUTHE PENINSULA — DOHA

Georgetown University in Qatar (GU-Q), in partnership with the HBKU College of Public Policy, is offering an Executive Education Certif-icate course to drive improve-ments around program effi-ciency and outcomes titled “What Works? Program Eval-uation Techniques for Policy Managers.”

Combining the expertise and resources of two leading QF-partner institutions, the four-day evaluation course will be delivered online and will run June 29 through July 2, 2020, from 10am to 12:30pm.

It is aimed at managers who supervise staff engaged in program evaluation activ-ities, professionals who advise policymakers, and analysts at research organi-zations, government agencies, and nonprofits who seek to develop a more rigorous understanding of program

evaluation techniques. Dr. Leslie Pal, Founding

Dean of the HBKU College of Public Policy, said: “Through our collaboration with Geor-getown University in Qatar, we are pleased to announce a learning opportunity that aims to build capacity in Qatar through hands-on training that gives organizations and institutions a better under-standing of the role and purpose of program evaluations.”

“Now more than ever, program evaluations are crucial to evaluate an organ-ization’s programs in order to determine the effectiveness and impact of invested resources. This evaluation process is also a key oppor-tunity to gather feedback for improvements and to guide t h e d e c i s i o n - m a k i n g process ,”says Rodolph Boughaba, the Associate Dean for Executive Education at GU-Q, adding that “a clear

understanding of how to evaluate that data is required to achieve these benefits, and this is what our course will provide.”

Now open for registration, the course will be taught by leading experts Dr. Adam Thomas, who teaches courses in quantitative methods and microeconomics at Georget-own’s McCourt School of Public Policy in Washington, DC, and Dr. Anis Ben Brik, Associate Professor at HBKU College of Public Policy.

No prior experience in program evaluation is required to enroll in the course; instructors will be fol-lowing a “ground-up” approach, under the assumption that participants are learning the material for the first time. Individuals can visit https://epe.qatar.geor-getown.edu/executive-edu-cation to register before the course deadline, or for more i n f o r m a t i o n o n t h e programs.

Dr. Adam Thomas (left) and Dr. Anis Ben Brik

Experts discuss prospects of translation in Korean, Arabic THE PENINSULA — DOHA

The Sheikh Hamad Award for Trans-lation and International Understanding (SHATIU) held yesterday a virtual symposium with the participation of a number of Korean and Arab academics and translators, under the title “The Status and Prospects of Translation in Korean language to and from Arabic”.

The symposium, which was mod-erated by Dr. Amr Othman, a professor of Islamic history in the Department of Social Sciences at Qatar University, hosted a number of participants including the award’s media team, and a number of Korean academics, one of them was Dr. Musa Gondo Kim, Pro-fessor of Arabic Language and Culture at Myeongji University in South Korea.

Gondo Kim spoke about “Korea’s experience in translating into Arabic and vice versa” where he highlighted the nature of official and individual efforts” in which he touched the history of the Arabic language in S. Korea.

Gondo Kim pointed out that Arabic entered Korea since the year 1965, when the departments of the Arabic Language and translation from Korean to Arabic were established and vice versa and now reached six departments in five Korean universities, and annually graduates about 220 students. Speaking about the translation in Korea Gondo Kim said translation in Korean is still less and needs to be revived as it is basis for cultural exchange between people.

He underlined the efforts of the Korean Ministry of Culture to improve the image of Korea abroad focusing on translations of materials related to Korean civilization and culture into Arabic. The number of PhD holders in Arabic reached 45 Koreans, calling for the necessity of making official and

individual efforts to raise the proportion of translation from Arabic to Korean.

Regarding selection of Korean lan-guage by the Sheikh Hamad Award for Translation and International Under-standing at its current season, Gondo Kim said this is a great gift to the Korean people and a valuable opportunity to open the door to taste the beauty of the Arabic language by Koreans.

For his part, Dr. Lee on SOP, editor-in-chief of the Arabic version of Koreana Magazine at the Hankook Uni-versity for Foreign Studies reviewed in his “his personal experience in the translation process from and into Korean”. Speaking about the number of translators from Korean to Arabic and vice versa, he pointed out that translators tend to the simultaneous interpretation due to its high financial rewards, calling on the official institu-tions to support the translation material

financially and morally.He talked about his personal

experience in bringing together a team of translators to work in trans-lating some Arabic works until the Koreana “magazine” is published and it is a magazine affiliated to the Min-istry of Foreign Affairs dealing with 11 languages.

The Arabic language is the seventh of these languages for which the Korean arts, civilization and culture are trans-lated, in addition to a number of initi-atives, noting that he translated from Korean to Arabic three books and 26 literary books but these are not suffi-cient to introduce the Korean civilization.

Dr. Nabila Yoon Eun Kyung, Head of the Department of Arabic Language at Hankook University for Foreign Studies, addressed in her paper entitled “The fields of translation in the Korean language (literature / humanities) the interest in reading

translated works from Arabic,” stressing the importance of cooper-ation between the Arab and Korean to ensure translation booms.

She noted that the translation movement in Korea has witnessed tre-mendous growth recently, indicating that the number of literary works trans-lated from Arabic to Korean reached 30 books and from Korean to Arabic reached 40 books.

She considered the number is still small compared to the depth and history of Arab civilization, and called for cooperation between Koreans and Arabs to enhance the role of translation.

For his part, the Jordanian researcher, Muhammad Qawabba, who holds a master’s degree in the Korean language, spoke about the difficulties faced by the Arabic translator in the Korean language, whether formal or cultural linguistic difficulties, indicating that the Korean language differs in its

morphological construction from the Arabic language in that it is an adhesive language suffixes are added to the roots.

He pointed out that the two lan-guages differ in the way of building sen-tences, numbers, etc., which constitutes a major obstacle for the translator if he does not master both languages.

The Korean language has what is known as Hanja, which are Chinese words and letters that entered the Korean language, so the translator is in great confusion he said, adding this would lead to the necessity of knowing the Chinese language, in addition to his knowledge of Korean and Arabic language.

Representing the award media team, Dr. Hanan Al-Fayyad, media advisor of the Sheikh Hamad Award, reviewed the objectives of the award, its vision and the annual financial value, distribution mechanism, in addition to the award categories and the impor-tance of choosing the Korean language as one of the five languages within the achievement category for the sixth season of the award.

Al-Fayadh indicated the efforts made through the award to encourage cultural exchange and communication between people, and for this reason a number of languages are chosen each year.

Attention was drawn toward this season 2020, to the Asian languages, so the Persian language was chosen as a second major language besides English, and five new languages were chosen in the achievement category, which are: Pashto, Bengali, Swedish and Hausa in addition to Korean. She invited those interested to enter through the website of the award (www.hta.qa) in order to download the nomination forms and further information about the award.

Experts participating in virtual symposium.

Regarding the selection of Korean language by the Sheikh Hamad Award for Translation and International Understanding (SHATIU) at its current season, Gondo Kim said this is a great gift to the Korean people and a valuable opportunity to open the door to taste the beauty of the Arabic language by Koreans.

Cadillac introduces first-ever CT4 luxury sedan in QatarTHE PENINSULA — DOHA

Cadillac has taken the next step in the realignment of its sedan port-folio with the introduction of the first-ever CT4 sport sedan to the Middle East. A game changer in the luxury-sedan segment, the 2020 Cadillac CT4 is poised to appeal to a new generation of customers and is now available for purchase from Mannai Automotive, the exclusive dealer in Qatar.

Commenting on the arrival of the Cadillac CT4 to the region, Christian Soemmer, Managing Director Cadillac International Operations and Cadillac Middle East said: “The Cadillac CT4 has been designed to turn heads and grab attention. The first-ever Cadillac CT4, was made to appeal to buyers who want to express themselves - particularly our younger audience in the luxury market, who are very important to us. With its athletic driving experience combined with the luxurious Cadillac DNA, the vehicle combines great propor-tions and taut surfacing, with advanced technology and

performance. We are very excited about the arrival of the CT4 in the region and look forward to seeing its dynamism on the roads.”

The sedan offers plenty for the senses, starting with its RWD pro-portions and an athletic design. A bold color-and-trim palette fea-turing 12 exterior color options along with eight distinct interior color, material and trim options, customers will have no trouble making a statement.

Driven by an all-turbocharged propulsion portfolio and lever-aging Cadillac’s award-winning rear-wheel-drive architecture (AWD available on the Luxury trim), the CT4 delivers a driving experience unmatched by front-drive competitors. The CT4’s sleek profile leverages the natural, long dash-to-front-axle proportional advantage of the rear-drive platform and, along with its wide stance, expresses presence, con-fidence and performance.

Bright exterior accents, along with unique grilles (with premium hot foil-stampings on the grille elements) and fascias, distinguish the CT4 Luxury and Premium

Luxury models. The Sport model is differentiated by darker accents and performance-inspired details, including unique grilles, fascias, rocker extensions, rear spoiler and exclusive performance design wheels2.

Each trim also features LED exterior lighting including head-lamps, tail lamps and signature vertical lights at all four corners.

The all-new CT4 is built on Cadillac’s award-winning RWD sedan architecture. Exceptional balance from near-perfect weight distribution contributes to one of the segment’s nimblest, most responsive driving experiences. Enhancements of the front and rear suspension systems, including Cadillac’s signature double-pivot MacPherson-type front sus-pension (with dual lower ball joints), are designed to improve road isolation and driver feedback.

Selectable vehicle drive modes are standard and allow

customers to enhance their vehicle settings for different pref-erences and conditions. The modes, Tour, Sport, Snow/Ice and Track are joined by new My Mode, which can alter the calibrations for transmission shifting, sus-pension, steering and brake feel, front/rear torque split (with AWD), vehicle sound character and other vehicle attributes.

Standard Continental self-sealing tires on the Luxury & Premium Luxury trims are a segment-first and contribute to the CT4’s balance of control in all conditions. They, along with the standard run-flat tires on the Sport trim, allow driving with most punctures that would otherwise sideline conventional tires requiring immediate replacement or repair.

CT4 leverages Cadillac’s proven turbocharging proficiency as the foundation for its spirited performance. The brand’s 2.0L

Twin-Scroll Turbo engine, with three-step sliding camshaft tech-nology along with Active Fuel Management and automatic stop/start, is standard and SAE-certified at 237 hp (177 kW) and 258 lb.-ft of torque (350 Nm). It is backed by a sophisticated eight-speed automatic transmission.

Cadillac’s new 2.7L segment-first Dual-Volute Turbo engine is available on Premium Luxury. Horsepower is estimated at 309 hp (230 kW) with 348 lb.-ft of torque (472 Nm) in the Premium Luxury model. It is matched with a segment-exclusive 10-speed automatic transmission with Elec-tronic Precision Shift.

Like the 2.0L Turbo engine, the 2.7L Turbo also features a three-step sliding camshaft design, along with Active Fuel Man-agement and automatic stop/start.

Designed for a new generation of luxury sport sedan customers, the CT4’s contemporary interior

reflects sculptural, tactile forms and sophisticated details wrapped around a driver-centric cockpit that artistically incorporates the brand’s signature technologies.

Ergonomically optimized and intuitive controls enhance driver confidence, while all the touch-points in the cabin are crafted for a confident, high-tech sense of tactility. Additionally, sophisti-cated use of metal accents throughout enhances the décor and technology-driven ambience.

A high-definition, 8-inch-diagonal touchscreen is the center-piece and focal point for the CT4’s connectivity. It is mounted promi-nently in the center of the instrument panel with superb integration that flows with the interior’s lines.

Authentic materials such as leather appointments enhance refinement, while a host of standard comfort and conven-ience features emphasize Cadil-lac’s attention to detail

Kuwait PM addressing National Assembly

06 WEDNESDAY 17 JUNE 2020 GULF / MIDDLE EAST

Russia vows to stand firm by Iran on nuclear deal

AFP — MOSCOW/TEHRAN

Russia yesterday vowed to stand by its ally Iran and resist attempts to promote an anti-Iranian agenda amid tensions over Tehran’s nuclear programme.

Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov made the comments during a visit to Moscow by his Iranian counterpart Javad Zarif, as Iran sought to fend off crit-icism over granting access to sites where past nuclear activity may have occurred.

The standoff comes as a landmark deal brokered in 2015 between Iran and world powers to limit Tehran’s nuclear pro-gramme continues to unravel.

“We will be doing every-thing so that no one can destroy these agreements,” Lavrov told reporters after talks with Zarif.

Lavrov accused the United States of trying to “manipulate” the United Nations Security Council in order to put pressure on Iran.

“Washington has no right to punish Iran” by leveraging the UN Security Council, Lavrov said, adding that US plans to extend an arms embargo on the Islamic republic “contravene international law.”

Moscow’s top diplomat said at the start of the talks that Russia would firmly oppose any attempts “to promote an anti-Iranian agenda”.

Zarif described develop-ments around the Iranian nuclear deal — formally known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Act ion—as “very dangerous”.

Iran had committed to curb its nuclear activities for sanc-

tions relief and other benefits.But Tehran has slowly

abandoned its commitments since US President Donald Trump’s decision two years ago to renounce the deal and reimpose sanctions.

Iran’s stockpile of enriched uranium is now almost eight times the limit fixed in the

accord, according to an assessment by IAEA, the UN nuclear watchdog.

However, the level of enrichment is still far below that needed for a nuclear weapon.

The head of the IAEA on Monday called on Iran to allow prompt access to two sites where past nuclear activity may

have occurred.In Moscow, Zarif implied

Washington was also using the International Atomic Energy Agency to further its own interests.

Iran “won’t allow the IAEA to become an instrument of abuse” for countries that want to scrap the Iran deal and

“destroy all international obli-gations,” he said in translated remarks.

He added that Iran had fully cooperated with the IAEA.

Iran criticised yesterday a plan to put forward a resolution at a meeting of the UN’s nuclear watchdog urging the country to allow access to two disputed sites.

European states are expected to put the resolution before the International Atomic Energy Agency’s (IAEA) board of governors’ meeting this week.

“Introduction of this reso-lution aiming to call on Iran to cooperate with the Agency... is disappointing and absolutely counterproductive,” said Kazem Gharib Abadi, Iran’s UN ambas-sador in Vienna.

Diplomats say the reso-lution will call on Iran to provide access to two locations where past nuclear activity may have occurred — sites to which the IAEA has been trying to gain access for months.

At the start of this week’s meeting on Monday, IAEA Director General Rafael Grossi repeated his appeal to Iran to “cooperate immediately and fully” and grant access.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov (right) and his Iranian counterpart Mohammad Javad Zarif attending a signing ceremony following their meeting in Moscow, yesterday.

Israel’s annexation of West Bankto flout international law: UNANATOLIA — RAMALLAH/GENEVA

The agreement by the new coalition government of Israel to annex significant parts of the occupied Palestinian West Bank after July 1 would violate a cornerstone principle of inter-national law, a group of UN experts said yesterday.

Forty-seven of the inde-pendent Special Procedures mandates appointed by the Human Rights Council said such move by Israel “must be mean-ingfully opposed by the inter-national community”’.

“The annexation of occupied territory is a serious violation of the Charter of the United Nations and the Geneva Conventions, and con-trary to the fundamental rule affirmed many times by the United Nations Security Council and General Assembly that the acquisition of territory by war or force is inadmis-sible,” they said in their statement.

“The international com-munity has prohibited annex-ation precisely because it incites wars, economic devastation, political instability, systematic

human rights abuses, and wide-spread human suffering.”

The experts said that Israel’s stated plans for annexation would extend sovereignty over most of the Jordan Valley and all of the more than 235 illegal Israeli settlements in the West Bank. They said the move would amount to taking approximately 30% of the West Bank.

The so-called “Peace to Prosperity” plan released by the administration of US President Donald Trump late January endorsed the annexation of the territory.

The UN said on many occa-sions that the 53-year-old Israeli occupation is the source of profound human rights vio-lations against the Palestinian people.

The experts said these vio-lations include land confis-cation, settler violence, discrim-inatory planning laws, the con-fiscation of natural resources, home demolitions, forcible population transfer, excessive use of force and torture, and labor exploitation.

They include extensive infringements of privacy rights,

restrictions on the media and freedom of expression, the tar-geting of women activists and journalists, detention of children, poisoning by exposure to toxic wastes, forced evictions, and displacement.

The violations also include economic deprivation and extreme poverty, arbitrary detention, lack of freedom of movement, food insecurity, dis-criminatory law enforcement, and the imposition of a two-tier system of disparate political, legal, social, cultural, and eco-nomic rights based on ethnicity and nationality.

“Palestinian and Israeli human rights defenders, who peacefully bring public attention to these violations, are slandered, criminalized, or labeled as terrorists,” they said.

“Above all, the Israeli occu-pation has meant the denial of the right of Palestinian self-determination.”

They noted that twice before, Israel had annexed occupied land -- East Jerusalem in 1980 and the Syrian Golan Heights in 1981.

Turkey assessing damages from earthquake in eastern provinceANATOLIA — BINGOL/ANKARA

Emergency workers are carrying out relief work in Turkey’s eastern province of Bingol after two powerful earth-quakes hit the region.

At least one person was killed and dozens injured after an earthquake on Sunday was followed by tremors on Monday. The country’s Disaster and Emergency Management Authority (AFAD) has dispatched 148 vehicles and more than 1,000 personnel to the affected region.

In the first stage, AFAD said 500,000 Turkish liras ($73,000) were sent to the Bingol Governorship to be

used in emergency supplies.It said earthquake victims were pro-

vided with 4,308 tents, 7,200 sleeping bags, 3,300 beds and 2,232 kitchen sets.

“Seven mobile radio stations have been established to ensure uninter-rupted communication in the region,” it added.

Among the injured, 30 people have been discharged from hospital, while four are still being treated.

Also, the governorate distributed toys to the children.

Moreover, the Turkish Red Crescent delivered 12,500 meals, 4,000 snack packages, 75 food parcels and a field kitchen of 5,000 people to the region.

Virus death toll in Iran tops 9,000AFP — TEHRAN

Iran said yesterday a third straight day of more than 100 coronavirus deaths took its overall toll past 9,000, attrib-uting the spike to increased travel by its citizens.

Health ministry spokes-woman Sima Sadat Lari warned the bleak figures could get even worse unless people stayed at home for the upcoming long weekend.

She said the increase in the daily toll was “due in large part to people’s travel in recent weeks”.

“We ask you to avoid unnecessary trips during the upcoming holidays so as not to see an increase in statistics in the future.”

Iran has a public holiday on Wednesday, the last day of the working week, making the upcoming weekend a three-day break. Lari said the 115 new deaths in the past 24 hours took Iran’s overall toll to 9,065.

She said another 2,563 people tested positive for COVID-19, bringing the total to 192,439 since the start of Iran’s outbreak. Iran had on Sunday reported 107 deaths from the illness -- the first time the tally has topped 100 since April 13.

The government reported the country’s first coronavirus cases on February 19, and it has since struggled to contain the outbreak.

It shut schools, postponed major public events and barred intercity travel to stop the virus’s spread in March before gradually easing restrictions from April.

Official figures have shown a rising trajectory in new con-firmed cases since early May, when Iran hit a near two-month low in daily recorded infections.

Lari said 10 of Iran’s 31 provinces were now classified as “red” -- the highest level on the government’s colour-coded risk scale. That compares with five provinces on Monday.

“We strongly recommend that you use a mask when you leave home,” she told Iranians.

“Homemade masks can also be effective,” she added.

There has been scepticism at home and abroad about Iran’s official COVID-19 figures, with concerns the real toll could be much higher.

QNA — KUWAIT CITY

The Kuwaiti Ministry of Health announced yesterday said that 527 new infections with coronavirus (COVID-19) were regis-tered during the past 24 hours, bringing the total number of cases registered in the country to 36,958.

Official spokesperson of the Ministry of Health, Dr. Abdullah Al Sanad, said in a press conference yesterday that 5 deaths were reported, taking the total number of deaths in the country to 303. All the new cases were in contact with previously infected people or are being investigated for sources of infection, he added.

Earlier, the Health Ministry announced the recovery of 675 people from the COVID-19 during the past 24 hours, bringing the tally to 28,206 cases.

527 new coronavirus infections, five deaths reported in Kuwait

Lebanon to probe pound-dollar rumoursAFP — BEIRUT

Lebanon’s public prose-cutor yesterday ordered a probe into rumours on social media on the plunge in value of the local currency that sparked three nights of violent protests.

Hundreds took to the streets from last Thursday to Saturday after the dollar exchange rate soared to almost 5,000 Lebanese pounds on the black market, according to money dealers, despite officially remaining pegged

at 1,507 pounds. Some local media or social posts reported the rate had reached as much as 6,000 or 7,000 pounds to the greenback.

A prosecutor ordered an investigation into “the spreading Thursday, by a number of people, of infor-mation on social media and other means of publication on a lack of dollars in the market and the increase of its exchange rate to 7,000 pounds to sow confusion and panic”, the National News Agency said.

The result was “extra incitement for people to withdraw their bank deposits in the Lebanese currency to buy dollars... and an unjustified increase in the price of consumer goods”, NNA said.

Lebanon is in the grips of an economic crisis, its worst since the 1975-1990 war, that in the autumn sparked protests against a political elite accused of incompetence and corruption.

Banks have since grad-ually limited dollar

withdrawals, forcing those in need to resort to much higher exchange rates from money changers.

Last week, the author-ities said they would inject dollars into the market to bring down the exchange rate.

On Monday, the public prosecutor also ordered a probe to identify those behind “posts or photos harming... the presidency” in view of pressing defa-mation charges, NNA said, sparking an outcry on social media.

Kuwait’s Prime Minister H H Sheikh Sabah Khalid Al Hamad Al Sabah (right), speaking during a parliament session at the National Assembly in Kuwait City, yesterday.

A Palestinian shepherd leads his flock of sheep past a sign, which signals the start of Zone A which is under Palestinian Authority and is forbidden for Israeli citizens, near the town of Bani Naim, east of the town of Hebron in the occupied West Bank and north of the Israeli settlement of Maale Hever, yesterday.

“We will be doing everything so that no one can destroy these agreements,” Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov told reporters after talks with his Iranian counterpart Mohammad Javad Zarif. Lavrov accused the United States of trying to “manipulate” the United Nations Security Council in order to put pressure on Iran.

Protest against violence

07WEDNESDAY 17 JUNE 2020 MIDDLE EAST / AFRICA

Members of the Libyan army carrying a large number of mines in different types, including anti-personnel and anti-tank, after they found them at a house to a vehicle in Tripoli, Libya, yesterday.

Egypt arrests journalist over Al Jazeera appearance

AFP — NEW YORK

Egypt has arrested a veteran journalist who has been openly critical of the government after he appeared on the Qatar-based Al Jazeera network, the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) said.

Mohamed Monir, 65 (pic-tured), was arrested by plain-clothes police officers early on Monday, the New York-based advocacy group said.

“Egyptian authorities must immediately and unconditionally release journalist Mohamed Monir and drop these baseless charges,” it said.

“Monir is already in failing health, and to detain him pending trial during a pandemic is exceptionally cruel.”

The long-time journalist and media commentator has been

remanded in custody for 15 days on charges of joining a terrorist group, spreading false news and misusing social media. His detention was also condemned by Paris-based group Reporters Without Borders, which called it “symptomatic of the difficulties” facing Egypt’s journalists.

Police had previously raided Monir’s apartment on Saturday. He was not home at the time but he obtained footage of the raid from a camera in his building which he shared online.

In a defiant video message he posted on Facebook, Monir vowed that the authorities’ attempt to arrest him would not stop him speaking out.

In a family statement posted on Monir’s Facebook page, his daughter Sara said: “He was merely exercising his freedom of speech and his words did not contain any incitement against the nation.”

In May, the CPJ documented the arrests of at least four Egyptian journalists, including Sameh Haneen, a Coptic Christian who also faces charges of joining a 'terrorist' organisation.

Egypt ranks as the third worst jailer of journalists according to the CPJ.

Landmines spell silent threat in Libyan former war zoneAFP — TRIPOLI

The smell of gunpowder still lingered in the battle-scarred south of Libya’s capital when Hicham Suleiman, a teacher in his 50s, cautiously returned to his home.

He left his car some 400 metres from his house and con-tinued on foot, anxious about booby traps hidden by retreating forces, like the one that days earlier had killed his neighbour.

Only the sound of Sulei-man’s footsteps broke the silence in the Tripoli outer suburb of Al-Khalla, which until several weeks ago had been a battlefront for more than one year.

When Hicham reached his property, he found the garden gate blown away by a shell and the house half-destroyed, a sight he said left him heart-broken.

“It’s not just because of my destroyed house, but the way

the war has transformed my neighbourhood,” he said. “It’s as if a huge meteorite hit it.”

Oil-rich Libya has been torn by years of violence, drawing in tribal militias and merce-naries, since the 2011 toppling and killing of longtime dictator

Muammar Gaddafi in a Western-backed uprising.

The latest escalation started on April 4, 2019, when strongman Khalifa Haftar, a former Gaddafi loyalist and one-time CIA asset, attacked Tripoli, the seat of the

UN-recognised Government of National Accord (GNA).

Hundreds died and some 200,000 people were displaced by the onslaught of Haftar forces backed by the United Arab Emirates, Egypt and Russian mercenary forces.

But then the GNA, with stepped-up support from Turkey, pushed back the would-be invaders and launched a lightening counter-offensive that has reclaimed all of north-western Libya.

The United Nations last week voiced “horror” over reports that eight mass graves had been discovered in Tarhuna, formerly the main rear base of Haftar forces southeast of Tripoli.

Human Rights Watch called on Haftar “to urgently hold his forces accountable for any war crimes they are committing and apparently advertising online”.

The scale of destruction is staggering in Al Khalla— a stra-tegic crossroads south of Tripoli — but many families want their homes back nonetheless, to stop drifting from shelter to shelter.

Libyan ordnance clearance experts have marked high-risk areas with signs and wall inscriptions, but the warnings have come too late for many.

Tanzanian President dissolves parliament before vote, touts development recordREUTERS — DAR ES SALAAM

Tanzanian President John Magufuli dissolved parliament yesterday ahead of elections in October, touting his government’s record in expanding infrastructure such as roads, electricity gener-ation and reforming the mining sector.

Nicknamed “the Bulldozer” for his ability to push through major projects, Magufuli took office in November 2015, pledging to expand the East African nation’s road and railway network and power-generation capacity.

His government also approved new mining regula-tions aimed at ensuring that the benefits of the mining sector were shared more equitably

between multinational mining companies and the state.

“Large reforms have taken place, including... restricting smuggling of raw minerals out of the country, establishing mineral markets in each region, increasing participation of arti-sanal miners,” he said.

Magufuli, who is expected to run for a second and final five-year term, told parliament in the administrative capital Dodoma that since he took office, the government had added another 3,500km of tar-macked road.

He said a new 300km standard gauge railway line between the commercial capital Dar es Salaam and Morogoro was almost com-plete, while a 422-km line from Morogoro to Dodoma

was a third complete.The government said on

Monday a 6.5-trillion-shilling ($2.81bn), 2,115 MW hydro-power dam, being built next to a park that is a UNESCO World Heritage site, was 40% complete.

“This project was highly protested (against) but we have succeeded,” Magufuli said.

While hailed for also tackling corruption and wasteful spending, rights groups and opposition parties have accused Magufuli’s gov-ernment of curbing human rights including limiting freedom of expression and pre-venting opposition parties from holding public rallies and sometimes private meetings.

The government has denied seeking to stifle dissent.

Uganda to hold elections in early 2021; campaign rallies banned

REUTERS — KAMPALA

Uganda will hold a presidential election between January 10 and February 8, 2021, author-ities said yesterday, introducing restrictions it said were aimed at slowing the spread of the new coronavirus.

S i m o n B y a b a k a m a Mugenyi, the election com-mission chairman, said the commission had banned cam-paign rallies and urged can-didates to use media instead to get their messages to voters.

Opposition parties have previously complained about r e s t r i c t e d a c c e s s t o broadcast media, especially in rural areas where they say security agencies bar them from appearing on political

shows. The commission will set the exact date of the election, also for parliament and local governments, later this year, Mugenyi said.

Uganda’s health ministry has reported 823 confirmed cases of COVID-19 and no deaths. It began easing a 45-day lockdown, one of the strictest on the continent, in mid-May.

Incumbent President Yoweri Museveni had said it would have been “madness” to hold the elections if the coro-navirus persisted.

In power since 1986, former rebel fighter Museveni has not confirmed whether he would run again, but the ruling National Resistance Movement (NRM) party has already asked him to stand.

Medical aid of Turkish Red Crescent in fighting against novel coronavirus pandemic are seen after reaching Khartoum, Sudan, yesterday.

ICRC fears coronavirus spreading silentlyin Somalia’s camps for the displaced

REUTERS — NAIROBI

The new coronavirus could be spreading undetected through camps across Somalia hosting some 2.6 million displaced people, the Red Cross warned yesterday, as floods and conflict swelled the numbers fleeing into overcrowded settlements.

Almost 500,000 people have been forced from their homes by recent floods in central Somalia, the United Nations said, putting further pressure on some 2,000 camps across the Horn of Africa nation, which has been mired in con-

flict since 1991. “We are concerned that

many COVID-19 cases are going undetected, especially in the internal displaced camps,” said Ana Maria Guzman, health coor-dinator for the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), in a statement.

“Because of the ongoing con-flict in Somalia, and also we are facing floods right now in Somalia, there is an increase in

the number of internal displaced population into urban areas and this creates the perfect envi-ronment for infectious disease.” Somalia, which has a population of about 15 million people, has recorded more than 2,600 coro-navirus cases and about 90 deaths, according to a tally by Johns Hopkins University.

Aid workers said the virus could spread undetected in the camps - where maintaining a

safe distance and regular hand-washing are a challenge - with particular concern for the capital Mogadishu, host to some 800,000 displaced people.

Officials from Somalia’s health ministry were not imme-diately available for comment.

“So far, no COVID-19 case was registered at the camps in Mogadishu,” government spokesman Ismail Mukhtar Omar said.

South Africa marks Youth Day with masks and social distancing

AP — JOHANNESBURG

With calls to protect each other against COVID-19, nearly 200 young South Africans, wearing face masks and keeping a distance, marked the country’s Youth Day holiday, the 44th anniversary of the 1976 Soweto students’ uprising which helped to bring about the end of apartheid, the country’s previous regime of racist, minority rule.

Lined up along a Soweto street, the young people sang anti-apartheid anthems and held up posters urging people to work together to stop the spread of the coronavirus. Some held up a banner saying “Use the spirit of June 16 to fight Covid 19.”

Others held up placards in support of the Black Lives Matter movement and calling for an end to domestic vio-lence against women. The commemoration marked June 16, 1976 when students in Soweto demonstrating against the white minority gov-ernment were fired upon by security forces and several students were killed.

A woman holds placards as she demonstrates against gender-based violence, outside the South African parliament in Cape Town, yesterday.

Algeria envoy returns to Paris after rift

AFP — PARIS

The Algerian ambassador to France has returned to his post, the embassy said yesterday, signalling an end to a spat sparked by the broadcast of French television documentaries on protests in Algeria.

The embassy, confirming Algerian media reports, said that Salah Lebdioui had resumed his duties on Monday.

His return came after the two countries’ presidents pledged in a telephone call on June 2 to “relaunch” rela-tions. The Elysee Palace said President Emmanuel Macron and his Algerian counterpart Abdelmadjid Tebboune “affirmed their willingness to work together for the sta-bility and security of the region”.

Algeria said both sides agreed on “full respect for the distinctiveness and sover-eignty of each of the two countries”.

The phone talk appeared to put an end to a diplomatic crisis triggered by the broadcast on French television of documentaries on the “Hirak” anti-government protest movement in Algeria.

Algiers recalled its ambas-sador for consultations on May 27, denouncing one of the films for “attacks on the Algerian people and its insti-tutions”, including the army.

Lagos suspends plans toreopen places of worshipREUTERS — LAGOS

Nigeria’s commercial hub Lagos has suspended plans to reopen places of worship after a review of the new coronavirus outbreak, the state governor said yesterday.

Earlier this month Nigeria’s government said places of worship, which the government ordered to close in March to halt the spread of the highly infectious virus, could reopen. It said each state would decide the terms on which its places of worship would reopen.

Christianity and Islam are widely practised in Lagos, as in the rest of Nigeria. Places of worship were due to open from June 19.

“We will not be proceeding with the opening of the places of worship,” Lagos State Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu told jour-nalists, adding the closures would be effective until further notice.

Sanwo-Olu said the decision followed a review of the out-break in the state.

“Our review indicted that we needed to suspend that attempt at opening,” he said.

“We are concerned that many COVID-19 cases are going undetected, especially in the internal displaced camps,” said Ana Maria Guzman, health coordinator for the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC).

These violations and measures share their targeting of the affected people based on their affiliation with the State of Qatar, which is discrimination based on nationality, national origin and a direct violation of the provisions of the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination (ICERD), H E Ambassador Al Mansouri said.

08 WEDNESDAY 17 JUNE 2020VIEWS

CHAIRMANDR. KHALID BIN THANI AL THANI

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

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

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

EDITORIAL

QATAR is celebrating the completion of the Education City Stadium, one of the venues for the FIFA World Cup 2022. Amir H H SheikhTamim bin Hamad Al Thani led the country in the celebrations by giving a mean-ingful speech. A major portion of the speech was ded-icated to – in H H the Amir’s own words – the real champions of the times, the medical staff and all others who are on the frontline against the COVID-19 pan-demic. Qatar feted the completion of the stadium with an online celebration broadcast by beIN Sports, ensuring all the precautionary measures adopted by the country to ward off the spread of the coronavirus.

H H the Amir’s speech conveyed a message of hope and revival of the world which is reeling under the unprecedented purge of COVID-19, the most formidable and invisible enemy the world has ever confronted. H H the Amir said: “As the world begins to open up, it is through your courage, dedication and sincerity that we truly believe in better days to come, the days when we will enjoy together watching the stars of the game in our stadiums”. H H the Amir concluded by saying: Qatar is looking forward, and more excited and enthusiastic than ever, to welcome guests from all over the world for an exceptional Word Cup.

Saluting the dedication of the healthcare workers during celebrations marking the completion of a landmark in Qatar, conveys the message of gratitude and approval of the authorities of the exemplary spirit of the frontline fighters in saving thousands of lives. This is really a moment which extends a soothing embrace to not only all those who are in the fight against coronavirus, but also for everybody who, to a certain extent are worried about their own future, often fearing about what will be the situation like in a post-COVID-19 world.

Under the wise leadership of H H the Amir, Qatar, has been very particular in saluting the ded-ication of the people in all sectors, whether it is common workers or high ranking officials. A few words can do wonders by lifting the spirit of those who, with their tireless efforts, work on the frontline to control the pandemic and these words will be paid off more than the monetary remuneration they get for their job. H H the Amir’s speech is a tes-tament of the how much Qatar is concerned about the wellbeing of these real warriors of the time and how thankful the whole nation is for their time and efforts.

A salute to the ‘champions’

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Quote of the day

We think that the US presence in Germany is important for the security not just of Germany but also for the security of the United States and especially for the security of Europe.

Heiko Maas, German Foreign Minister

H E Ambassador Ali Khalfan Al Mansouri, Permanent Representative of the State of Qatar to the United Nations, attending the general debate under the ninth item of the agenda of the 43rd session of the Human Rights Council in Geneva.

QNA — GENEVA

The State of Qatar stressed the importance of the Human Rights Council, and its relevant mechanisms, taking the necessary measures to stop racist discriminatory human rights violations by blockading countries, holding perpetrators accountable, compensating those affected, and ensuring that their recur-rence is prevented.

This came in the State of Qatar’s statement, delivered by H E Permanent Represent-ative of the State of Qatar to the United Nations in Geneva, Ambassador Ali Khalfan Al Mansouri, during the general debate under the ninth item of the agenda of the 43rd session of the Human Rights Council under the title racism, racial discrimination, xeno-phobia, and related intol-erance, follow-up to and implementation of the Durban Declaration and Program of Action.

H E Ambassador Al Mansouri clarified that this month marks three years since the racist discriminatory measures taken by the block-ading countries against the State of Qatar and its citizens, the effects of which are still found in numerous, sys-tematic, and continuous vio-lations of human rights, as the number of complaints received since the beginning of the unjust blockade reached more than 4,000 complaints on gross violations of more than 12 basic human rights.

These violations and measures share their tar-geting of the affected people based on their affiliation with the State of Qatar, which is discrimination based on nationality, national origin and a direct violation of the provisions of the Interna-tional Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination (ICERD), he said.

H E the Ambassador stated that the joint families whose members were sepa-rated due to the violation of the right to freedom of

movement and residence, bear the brunt of these viola-tions, which left a severe psy-chological impact on them and caused social difficulties that are difficult to correct. He pointed out that these viola-tions affected other basic rights, such as the right to education, ownership, health, freedom of opinion and expression, and the practice of religious rites, among others.

At a time when the world is undergoing many interna-tional challenges, the latest of which is the coronavirus (COVID-19), and the need for cooperation and the preva-lence of wisdom, racist and discriminatory practices arise to ravage human principles and the values of freedom, justice, and equality, he added.

H E Ambassador Al Man-souri pointed out that expe-rience has demonstrated that racist and discriminatory practices that are the source of government decisions rep-resent the worst forms of racism because they become part of the policies

implemented by official agencies by the force of law, and there is no way to resist them through national law systems, which results in the absence of accountability, the promotion of a culture of impunity from punishment, and undermining the rule of law.

The Ambassador added that due to the absence of national accountability in the blockading countries for the violations that resulted from it, which contributed to wasting the rights of victims to litigate and seek compen-sation, Qatar resorted to international fair mecha-nisms such as the Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, which issued two decisions accepting the jurisdiction to consider com-plaints submitted by the State of Qatar against Saudi Arabia and the UAE, and the International Court of Justice, which issued interim orders that include a mora-torium on some human rights violations committed by the UAE in the context of this crisis.

QNA — DOHA

The State of Qatar, repre-sented by the Ministry of Municipality and Envi-ronment, will participate in the celebration of the World Day to Combat Desertifi-cation and Drought , which this year focuses on the theme “Food. Feed. Fibers”, and the relations between consumption and land, in terms of changing public tendencies towards production patterns of the excessive human consumption, which is the main cause of desertification and land degradation.

The Ministry of Munici-pality and Environment, rep-resented by the Environ-mental Affairs Sector, is making great efforts in the field of desertification control, through the implementation of several programs, initia-tives, projects and works related to preserving the veg-etation and working to reha-bilitate the nursery and cul-tivate the Qatari land with plants from the Qatari environment.

These efforts included the cultivation of (3,280) seedlings Land within the framework of rehabilitating the Qatari mainland during 2019, transferring (1,773) wild trees from infra-structure projects sites, col-lecting large quantities of wild plant seeds, and enhancing the State’s seed stock in the genebank, including endangered and rare plants such as Ghaf and land bomber, respectively.

In this regard, the Minister of Municipality and Envi-ronment H E Abdullah bin Abdulaziz bin Turki Al Subaie issued the ministerial decision No. (180) of 2019 to extend the decision to ban camel grazing in the country for a period of two years, which contributed to the res-toration of some lands on the Qatari mainland for its natural growth, while it is noticed in the Qatari mainland in recent years, the renewal of wild trees such as tanning, Sidr and Al-Osaj sig-nificantly after the issuance of the decision.

The permanent work

team to study the positive and negative effects of the decision to ban grazing on the vegetation and camel herd, which was also formed by H E the Minister of Munic-ipality and Environment, set out his own plan, with the formation of field teams that started field studies, where the study relied for the first time on comparisons between completely closed grassland, and grassland prone to grazing, and others exposed to camel herding, to determine the actual effects according to the study’s outputs, given that the first report of the team has been completed.

In a related context, a working group has been formed to update the national strategy to combat desertifi-cation from the relevant authorities in Doha, in accordance with the decision of H E the Minister of Munici-pality and Environment No. (373) of 2017, as well as the completion of drafting a national plan of action to combat desertification, while work is underway to

introduce the required amendments and updates on it in preparation for adoption.

Within the framework of protecting and rehabilitating nurseries, (16) have been fenced to date in various parts of the State, some of which have been completely closed to protect the threatened or extinct species of plants, while some nurseries have been partially closed to protect plants from the threat, in addition to carrying out farming and re-operations in addition to carrying out farming operations, rehabili-tation and protection of others as an important source of plant genetic resources in the State.

The World Day to Combat Desertification and Drought falls on June 17 every year and aims to raise public awareness of international efforts to combat desertifi-cation, and remind everyone that neutralizing the impact of land degradation can be achieved through problem solving, strong community participation and cooperation at all levels.

Qatar affirms importance of stopping racial, discriminatory human rights violations by blockading countries

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Qatar celebrates World Day to Combat Desertification and Drought

Established in 1996

09WEDNESDAY 17 JUNE 2020 OPINION

We have spent months without seeing friends and family, without school or even most of us being able to go to work or holidays. Scientists around the world are still in trying hard to develop the vaccine to end the corona crisis. Despite easing of procedures and the reopening of some services, people are being encouraged to wear face masks in case if they do not adhere to the social distancing. But, it is as if we are waiting for the miracle to bring normalcy to lives, which does not appear in the horizon!

Perhaps everyone would like to know when the COVID-19 pandemic will end.

Of course, when people ask about when the pandemic will end, they may ask about the end of social distancing or even isolation? In other words, I could say also that the pandemic can end not because of the nature disease but because people are tired of being in a state of fear and anticipation. However it is obvious that people are pushed to adapt and learn to live with the disease. People also continue to talk about returning to normal, but the future with a permanent virus means that normalcy will not be restored. I can assure here

that when we find different ways to adapt and discover a treatment or vaccine, then we will begin to restore our lives.

Nevertheless, can we say now that October 2020 will not look like October of last year due to many potential sce-narios, including the fact that the first wave struck early this year with millions infected, and thousands of deaths are expected worldwide by August 2020, with potential small waves that might follow such pandemic.

The second scenario, with the possibility of the pan-demic continuing in the coming months of this year globally and might return again for a longer period of time after the summer, as a result of the reduction in the

numbers of infected and deaths cases during the summer, which give rise to officials as well as individual in the society to ease health measures and physical dis-tancing and thus failure to pay attention or discover early warning signs that a new out-break may occur. Not to mention that the summer weather will not make a dif-ference because most coun-tries are not immune to the disease in the first place, however countries with a warmer or hot climate are still experiencing significant infection rates, such as in Iran and Australia!

Moreover, the third possi-bility or scenario, at which the current wave of the pandemic creates a new normal state, and it continues until the end of 2022. Interestingly at this stage the best scenario is that an effective vaccine will be developed, if not, then the world will continue to suffer from this pandemic until at least half of the world’s popu-lation is infected, with or without the development of disease and possible devel-opment of herd immunity.

Despite the darkness that we observe in some of these scenarios, history gives us some glimpses of human experiences with epidemics in

the past, including how people lived with the Spanish flu that broke out between 1918 and 1919 and infected about 500 million people, although physician at the time did not have the same methods of fighting the pan-demic that we have now, but it ended with turning into a natural infection that gives immunity to those who recover from it. Also, most of us remember swine flu in 2009, when scientists were able to find a vaccine for it, six months after its appearance.

Consequently, we must realize that if any genetic transformation of the virus occurs, it would be difficult currently to find a vaccine for it, as every transformation increases the strength and severity of the virus. However, the production of the vaccine may be delayed until the end of the year 2021, as one of the members of the World Health Organization mentioned weeks ago, given the stages of development Vaccine.

On the other hand, according to recent studies and due to increased cases of recoveries, there is hope that corona virus will lose some of its properties and thus weaken and become endemic, so that it will spread seasonally and will live like most viruses, hoping such pandemic and its reper-cussions will end.

Generally speaking, the efforts of researchers around the world are still continuing, and currently over 100 vac-cines are under development,

including 8 types that have been approved for clinical trials to date. Nevertheless, there are three laboratories that leading in a race to develop a vaccine. They have begun experimenting with serum on humans, one in the United States, another in China and a third one in the United Kingdom (which is expected to be available next September if proven effective), not forgetting the period of production, then export and distribution which might take more months as well!

No doubt with this stage of the pandemic wave, when the reproduction number R0 (which represents the average number of people expected to be infected by a person with the virus) becomes less than one, then we can think about easing restrictions and social distancing, but if infection spreads again it would be wor-rying, so it would be reasonable to keep restrictions in place.

It is evident that we understand that easing the restrictions does not mean the end of the corona crisis, but we must start with a clear strategy that includes several steps for gradual exit from social distancing, following a specific time plan and stages through which the results are evaluated and led to adoption of four phased plan of easing restrictions in Qatar.

At the end, individuals bear the responsibility to adhere to the guidelines in order to limit the spread of the virus, wearing masks with physical distancing especially in public places, as third of the people infected with virus do not show any symptoms, but may spread the infection. Unfortunately this virus is completely new and despite plenty of pre-dictive models, predicting the end of this virus is still not possible, unless the world comes out with vaccine or treatment. Perhaps it has come to stay and the most important question is; will we live with it as safely as influenza viruses?

Dr. Yousuf Ali Al Mulla is a physician, medical innovator and educator. For any queries regarding the content of the column, he can be contacted at:dryusufalmulla@gmail.com

How will we live with COVID-19?

CHRISTOPHER RUGABER& JOSH BOAK — AP

Layoffs are slowing, unem-ployment is declining and hiring is gradually rising, suggesting that a steady rebound may be afoot in the US job market. Or is it?

So many uncertainties are overhanging the economy that no one knows whether hiring will expand steadily in the months ahead or merely plateau as employers recall only enough of their laid-off staffers to partially reopen for business.

The most dangerous risk is that the coronavirus will roar back with renewed intensity, forcing millions of businesses to shut down again and resume deep job cuts.

The outlook is so opaque that at a news conference last week, Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell used the words “uncertain” or “uncertainty” seven times to describe the outlook for economy. “The extent of the downturn and the pace of recovery,” Powell said, “remain extraordinarily uncertain and will depend in large part on our success in containing the virus.”

While it’s hard to say what the future holds for America’s roughly 30 million unem-ployed, here are some key factors that will determine how that future unfolds.

Will there be another wave of the virus?

On Thursday, stock prices plunged more than 5%, driven largely by reports that the number of coronavirus cases is rising again in much of the

United States as more reo-pened businesses draw cus-tomers without the full use of protective masks and social distancing. On Monday, stock indexes extended their losses.

An Associated Press analysis this week found that in 21 states, the rolling seven-day average of new cases per capita was higher than the average seven days earlier. In some states, reported cases and hospitalisations surged after state officials lifted their business lockdowns.

Powell and other econo-mists have warned that a second viral outbreak would lead many more consumers to stay home, thereby dealing another blow to restaurants, bars and retailers,and likely causing more layoffs.

Will many companies go out of business?

Many people who have lost jobs say they regard their layoffs as temporary and that as the economy rebounds, they expect to return to their old employers. This has already happened to some employees of restaurants, retailers and construction companies. If that trend were to continue, it could deliver a relatively fast recovery and a steady decline in unemployment.

Yet as the recession that began in February drags on, more and more of the unem-ployed will face a tougher problem: They may have no business to go back to.

Retailers, for example, are closing stores permanently and declaring bankruptcy. Dis-count goods retailer Tuesday

Morning late last month became the fifth large retail chain to go bankrupt amid the pandemic, after J C Penney, J. Crew, Neiman Marcus and dis-counter Stage Stores.

Coresight Research says it expects 20,000 to 25,000 stores to permanently close this year, up from 9,800 last year, which was itself a record. This trend would mean that hundreds of thou-sands of jobs wouldn’t return. Some companies in the travel and energy industries will likely go out of business in the coming weeks or months.

So far, the pace of business bankruptcies has yet to surge. Amy Quackenboss, executive director of the American Bankruptcy Institute, credits the government’s relief efforts, notably its small business lending program, with limiting the number of household and business bankruptcies.

“As this relief runs its course, however,” she added, “mounting financial chal-lenges may result in more

households and companies seeking the shelter of bankruptcy.”

How fast will consumers restart spending?

The lifting of government-ordered shutdowns of nones-sential businesses will increasingly allow more Americans to shop and spend. But consumers won’t likely return to their pre-pandemic habits of eating out, travelling by plane, going to movies or visiting yoga studios and bar-bershops until they’re con-fident that they won’t be infected. And that would likely require significantly expanded testing capability or the availability of a vaccine.

In the meantime, as long as consumer spending remains subdued, so will hiring. The outlook is particularly dim for businesses that depend on mass gatherings - from concert venues and professional sports leagues to airlines and the film and television industry.

Professional sports, according to analytics firm EMSI, creates up to 1.3 million jobs, some of which are only part time or seasonal. Still, about 3,000 workers are needed to make US Bank Stadium in Minneapolis hum for a Vikings game, for example.

How many restaurant jobs will return?

As much as it has any industry, the pandemic has devastated restaurants and left their future deeply uncertain. Forced to close their dining rooms to comply with government lockdowns, US restaurants and bars

slashed 5.4 million jobs in April, a 45% plunge. Barely 1.4 million of those lost jobs returned in May.

Restaurants are increas-ingly, if only partially, reo-pening, in many cases with their indoor dining strictly limited to fewer customers. It’s unclear whether most Amer-icans will regain their pre-pan-demic enthusiasm for eating out. Local governments, newly vigilant about a potential resur-gence of the virus, may con-tinue to require restaurants to restrict seating capacity.

“A lot of those restaurants may not have been able to carry themselves through the shutdown … or they can’t make a profit on a table setup that is half of what is used to be,’’ said Barbara Denham, senior economist at the com-mercial real estate research firm Moody’s Analytics REIS.

Will government aid end too quickly?

Without the nearly $3 trillion in government aid that has been distributed, the unemployment rate would be even higher than its current 13.3%. Just over half the rescue aid has been given to house-holds and businesses, keeping workers employed, mortgages and rents paid and many bills current. But the economy will likely need another major dose of aid to fuel the recovery, and it’s unknown just how much will be spent or where it would go. The risk is that without more aid soon, a rebound in consumer spending could plateau and hiring gains could shrivel.

House Democrats

approved an additional $3 trillion aid package in May. It includes funding for state and local governments, which are starved of tax revenue while facing much higher health care costs. Many states will be forced to lay off workers.

Will downtown business districts hollow out?

The pandemic disrupted the basics of commerce. Workers stopped going to offices. Bars and restaurants lost their lunch and happy hour crowds. Fitting rooms at clothiers became a possible health risk. Many cities long ago based the economic redevelopments of their city centers around restaurants, coffee shops and yoga studios - in-person services that won’t fully return for the foreseeable future.

Without the recovery of those businesses, many jobs that revolved around downtown commerce won’t return, either.

Starbucks is shifting more toward a takeout model, eschewing the original vision of an Italian coffeehouse where drinkers could freely linger. Among smaller busi-nesses, about a quarter of res-taurants and bars are still closed, and roughly half of leisure and hospitality retailers are shuttered, according to Homebase, a scheduling and worker man-agement company.

Workers have been steadily returning since early May, Homebase’s data shows. That progress may not last, though, if downtown neigh-bourhoods don’t soon regain their former vibrancy.

Can job market sustain its gains? Uncertainties cloud future

DR. YOUSUF ALI AL MULLA

Consequently, we must realize that if any genetic transformation of the virus occurs, it would be difficult currently to find a vaccine for it, as every transformation increases the strength and severity of the virus.

People also continue to talk about returning to normal, but the future with a permanent virus means that normalcy will not be restored. I can assure here that when we find different ways to adapt and discover a treatment or vaccine, then we will begin to restore our lives.

Visitors, wearing protective masks, have their temperature checked and show Ehteraz app at the entrance of Mall of Qatar following its reopening on Monday, as the country gradually lifts its COVID-19 measures.

The most dangerous risk is that the coronavirus will roar back with renewed intensity, forcing millions of businesses to shut down again and resume deep job cuts.

10 WEDNESDAY 17 JUNE 2020ASIA

20 Indian soldierskilled in borderclashes with ChinaREUTERS, AP — NEW DELHI

The Indian army said yesterday that 20 of its soldiers were killed in clashes with Chinese troops at a disputed border site, in a major escalation of a weeks-long standoff in the western Himalayas.

In a statement, the army said that 17 critically injured Indian troops succumbed to their wounds, in addition to an officer and two soldiers who had died earlier.

Indian and Chinese troops have disengaged in the areas where the clashes took place, the statement said.

The clash — during which neither side fired any shots, according to Indian officials — is the first deadly confrontation between the two Asian giants since 1975.

The Indian army said an earlier statement “violent faceoff” took place in Galwan Valley in the Ladakh region on Monday night, “with casualties on both sides.” “Senior military officials of the two sides are currently meeting at the venue to defuse the situation,” the statement said.

China, for its part, accused Indian forces along the border of carrying out “provocative

attacks” on its troops, leading to “serious physical conflicts” between the sides.

Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian gave no details of any casualties on the Chinese side, but said that China had strongly protested the incident while still being committed to maintaining “peace and tran-quility” along the disputed and heavily militarized border.

“But what is shocking is that on June 15, the Indian troops seriously violated the consensus of the two sides, crossed the border illegally twice and carried out provocative attacks

on Chinese personnel, resulting in serious physical conflicts between the two border forces,” Zhao said.

India’s Ministry of External Affairs said in a statement that the incident happened “as a result of an attempt by the Chinese side to unilaterally change the status quo” in the Galwan Valley.

Thousands of soldiers from the two countries, backed by armoured trucks and artillery, have been facing off just a few hundred metres apart for more than a month in the Ladakh region near Tibet. Army officers and diplomats have held a series of meetings to try to end the impasse, with no breakthrough.

Indian authorities have offi-cially maintained near-total silence on the issues related to the confrontation, and it was not immediately clear how the three Indian soldiers died.

But two Indian security offi-cials familiar with latest devel-opments said that soldiers from the two sides engaged in fistfights and stone-throwing, which led to the casualties. Both said that no shots were fired by either side. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity in keeping with

government regulations.Indian Prime Minister

Narendra Modi did not comment on the clash in a tel-evised meeting yesterday with state officials.

The tense standoff started in early May, when Indian offi-cials said that Chinese soldiers crossed the boundary in Ladakh at three different points, erecting tents and guard posts and ignoring verbal warnings to leave. That triggered shouting matches, stone-throwing and fistfights, much of it replayed on television news channels and social media.

China has sought to downplay the confrontation while saying the two sides were communicating through both their front-line military units and their respective embassies to resolve issues.

The disputed border covers nearly 3,500km of frontier that the two countries call the Line of Actual Control.

Though skirmishes aren’t new along the frontier, the standoff at Ladakh’s Galwan Valley, where India is building a strategic road connecting the region to an airstrip close to China, has escalated in recent weeks.

India and China fought a border war in 1962 that also spilled into Ladakh. The two countries have been trying to settle their border dispute since the early 1990s without success.

Since then, soldiers from the two sides have frequently faced off along the frontier, which stretches from Ladakh in the north to the Indian state of Sikkim in the northeast.

Lieutenant General D S

Hooda, a former head of the Indian military’s Northern Command, under which Kashmir and Ladakh fall, said the incident was the “most serious confrontation” between India and China since 1975, when Chinese troops killed four Indian soldiers in an ambush in the Twang region of north-eastern India’s Arunachal Pradesh state.

“It’s a very complicated and serious situation, and it will take real, hard negotiating skills to resolve this,” Hooda said.

Lieutenant General Vinod Bhatia, a former director-general of Indian military operations, said the incident was “serious but local.” “Such incidents can happen, partic-ularly when (opposing) sol-diers are in such proximity,” he said.

Indian army soldiers rest next to artillery guns at a makeshift transit camp before heading to Ladakh, near Baltal, southeast of Srinagar, yesterday.

New Zealand no longer free of virus as two test positiveREUTERS — WELLINGTON

It took just eight days for New Zealand to lose its COVID-free status when two women who had been given permission to leave quarantine early after arriving from abroad tested positive for the coronavirus, authorities said yesterday.

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern, who has enjoyed enormous popularity for her success at ridding the country of coronavirus infection, said the government would review what happened, but that it was clear checks were not adequate in this case.

“Vigorous testing is now taking place across those who

were in the quarantine facility at the same time, and those who may have had any, even the remotest chance of contact (with the women),” Ardern said in a Facebook Live post.

New Zealand had trum-peted its achievement last week of becoming one of the first countries in the world to elim-inate COVID-19 and return to pre-pandemic normality, lifting all social and economic restric-tions except border controls.

The country requires all people arriving from abroad to quarantine for 14 days to avoid reintroducing the disease. The two women aged in their 30s and 40s had travelled from Britain to visit a dying parent in

Wellington on June 7, the director general of health said in a news conference.

Both had gone into quar-antine in Auckland after landing, but had been given special permission to leave on compassionate grounds, even though one had symptoms which she attributed to a pre-existing condition. They tested positive after they returned to quarantine.

The new cases ended a 24-day streak of no new infec-tions in the country.

Health Minister David Clark said he was suspending all exemptions to the quarantine rules until he had confidence in the system.

“Compassionate exemp-tions should be rare and rig-orous and it appears that this case did not include the checks that we expected to be hap-pening. That’s not acceptable.”

One family member of the women has been isolated in Wellington. Staff at the hotel they women lived in would be tested. Co-passengers on their flight, staff at Auckland airport and anyone else whom the women met would be contacted.

The cases take the total number recorded in the country to 1,506. Deaths from the disease remain at 22, among the lowest in the developed world.

India’s overwhelmedhealth workers brace for monsoon amid virusAFP — MUMBAI

With hospitals already severely stretched, coronavirus-hit India is now bracing for the monsoon and its deadly annual onslaught of mosquito-borne illnesses, with an overwhelmed army of public health workers the only defence.

Every year illnesses such as dengue fever and malaria infect more than half a million people and kill hundreds in India as the monsoon brings much-needed rain but also devastation and disease.

With more than three decades of experience as a doctor in India’s chronically underfunded public healthcare system, Vidya Thakur —medical superintendent at Mumbai’s Rajawadi Hospital —is used to managing “heavy burdens”.

But now, she says, “COVID-19 has left us helpless... and the monsoon will make things even more difficult”.

Every bit of space at the 580-bed state-run hospital where she works is already devoted to dealing with the pandemic. Beds crowd cor-ridors, storage rooms function as wards and staff are overworked.

At Mumbai’s massive Lok-manya Tilak Municipal General Hospital, better known as Sion, undergraduates have been drafted into service, medical resident Shariva Ranadive said.

Many experienced doctors and nurses are staying on the sidelines because they are vul-nerable to the virus due to their

age or pre-existing conditions such as diabetes.

“Everyone is working con-stantly... we are overwhelmed,” Thakur said.

And now with the monsoon having arrived in Mumbai on its months-long journey north-wards, she is readying for the usual rush of seasonal ailments.

A particular problem is that many seasonal illnesses have symptoms that are virtually indistinguishable from corona-virus, such as fever, breathing difficulties and loss of appetite.

This means more testing, more isolation beds and more protective equipment will be needed to ensure that patients are diagnosed correctly and not exposed to coronavirus too.

“We will need to treat eve-ryone as if they were a COVID-19 patient,” said Thakur. “Every precaution will have to be taken.”

Healthcare workers are not the only ones battling exhaustion.

A months-long lockdown to prevent the epidemic from spreading left Mumbai with an acute shortage of sanitation workers.

Thousands of public health workers who fumigate neigh-bourhoods to kill disease-car-rying mosquitoes had to delay those crucial efforts for two months to focus on sanitation instead.

“Many of our men are doing double shifts, working 14 hours straight,” said Rajan Narin-grekar, the head of the city’s insecticide department.

Sri Lanka police

seize journalist’s

laptop over Swiss

kidnap claim

AFP — COLOMBO

A Sri Lankan journalist working for The New York Times has said police raided her home and seized her laptop over the alleged kidnapping of a Swiss embassy staffer last year.

A diplomatic row erupted in late November after the Swiss embassy said the woman was abducted and sexually assaulted by unidentified attackers.

Her alleged kidnap came a day after a Sri Lankan police inspector investigating cases involving the powerful Rajapaksa family — who returned to power in November — sought asylum in Switzerland.

Dharisha Bastians — a New York Times correspondent and former chief editor of the Sunday Observer, a local newspaper — said that police raided her home in the capital Colombo last Tuesday.

“Five CID (Criminal Inves-tigation Department) officials arrived at my residence in Colombo with a warrant to search the house... my computer was found, seized and sealed,” she tweeted on Monday.

Bastians said police earlier also obtained her mobile phone call records and “exposed the information”.a

“As a journalist, I was hor-rified at the public exposure of my telephone records, which could seriously endanger and compromise my sources and contacts, then, now and in the future.”

Transporting bicyclesMen pull a cart loaded with bicycles in a bicycle market in Dhaka, Bangladesh, yesterday.

HK leader urges people not to ‘demonise’ security lawAP — HONG KONG

Hong Kong leader Carrie Lam said yesterday that she hopes opponents of a new national security law being imposed by China do not “demonise and stigmatise” the legislation because doing so would mean pitting themselves against resi-dents of the semi-autonomous Chinese territory.

“The people of Hong Kong want to see stability again, they want a safe environment where they can work and live,” Lam told reporters.

She said people were “sick and tired” of violence in Hong

Kong and intervention by foreign forces in the city.

China’s ceremonial par-liament in May approved the decision to enact a national security law in Hong Kong, aimed at curbing subversive, secessionist, terrorist and foreign intervention activities in the city following months of anti-government protests last year.

“We are part of the People’s Republic of China, but we don’t have a mechanism to protect national security,” Lam said. “This is a risk not just to over 7 million people in Hong Kong, it’s also a risk to 1.4 billion

people in the country.” Lam spoke ahead of a meeting this week by the Standing Com-mittee of the National People’s Congress, which exercises leg-islative power in China. The law is not on the meeting’s agenda, but Hong Kong delegate Tam Yiu Chung said in an interview Monday that items could be added.

Critics consider the imminent legislation an attack on the “one country, two systems” framework in which China promised Hong Kong a high degree of autonomy and freedoms not found on the mainland when the former

British colony was returned to Chinese control in 1997. They fear that the law will be used to curb any dissent in Hong Kong.

Details about the law have not been disclosed, though Lam said the specifics will be estab-lished. She said people “don’t need to worry” about this because at the end of the day, it is for Hong Kong’s authorities to enforce the law.”

“Please accept and under-stand why we have to do it,” she said. “The only purpose of this task is to protect Hong Kong and the country.”

The anti-government protests had subsiding during coronavirus

restrictions, but have returned to the city in recent weeks, even though social distancing measures remain in place.

Lam said Hong Kong will relax its measures gradually.

“It would be risky if we completely lift the measures,” she said. “In recent times in some cities such as Beijing, we have seen imported cases and some countries have seen an influx of cases after relaxing measures.” Hong Kong’s sec-retary for food and health, Sophia Chan, said Tuesday that the ban on public gatherings will be relaxed from eight to 50 people.

China's Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian gave no details of any casualties on the Chinese side, but said that China had strongly protested the incident while still being committed to maintaining “peace and tranquillity”.

11WEDNESDAY 17 JUNE 2020 ASIA

North Korea blows up liaison office shared with SouthREUTERS — SEOUL

North Korea blew up an office set up to foster better ties with South Korea yesterday in a “terrific explosion” after threat-ening action if North Korean defectors went ahead with a campaign to send propaganda leaflets into the North.

North Korea’s state news agency KCNA said the liaison office in the border town of Kaesong, which had been closed since January due to the coronavirus, was “completely ruined”.

Surveillance video released by South Korea’s defence min-istry showed a large explosion that appeared to bring down the four-storey structure. It also appeared to cause a partial col-lapse of a neighbouring 15-storey high-rise that had served as a residential facility for South Korean officials who staffed the liaison office.

The destruction of the building represents a major setback to efforts by South Korean President Moon Jae-in to coax North Korea into cooperation.

It also appears to be a further blow to US President Donald Trump’s hopes of per-suading North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons and open up to the outside world.

“We are aware that North Korea destroyed the liaison office in Kaesong and remain in close coordination with our Republic of Korea allies,” a senior US administration official said.

The State Department did

not immediately comment, but announced that Deputy Sec-retary of State Stephen Biegun, the top US official dealing with North Korea, would travel with Secretary of State Mike Pompeo to Hawaii yesterday.

Sources said Pompeo will hold talks with China’s top dip-lomat Yang Jiechi in Hawaii on Wednesday on issues including North Korea.

China is North Korea’s main ally and neighbour and shares US concerns about Pyongyang’s weapons programs. US officials have stressed the need for Beijing to strictly enforce international sanctions on North Korea.

Russia said yesterday it was concerned about the situation on the Korean peninsula and called for restraint from all sides.

South Korea’s national security council said South Korea would sternly respond if North Korea continued to raise tensions.

The destruction of the office “broke the expectations of all people who hope for the devel-opment of inter-Korean

relations and lasting peace on the peninsula”, deputy national security advisor Kim You-geun told a briefing.

Reclusive North Korea and the democratic South are tech-nically still at war because their 1950-53 conflict ended in a truce, not a treaty.

Tensions have been rising over recent days with North Korea threatening to cut ties and retaliate over the propa-ganda leaflets, which carry messages critical of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, including on human rights.

South Korean Vice-Unifi-cation Minister Suh Ho, who co-headed the liaison office, called the demolition “unprecedented in inter-Korean relations” and a “nonsensical act.” KCNA said the office was blown up to force “human scum and those, who have sheltered the scum, to pay dearly for their crimes”.

Several defector-led groups, which North Korea refers to as “human scum”, have regularly sent flyers over the border, together with food, $1 bills, mini radios and USB sticks containing South Korean dramas and news into North Korea, usually by balloon or in bottles by river.

The first diplomatic mission of its kind, the liaison office was established in 2018 as part of a series of projects aimed at reducing tensions between the two Koreas.

The building had originally been used as offices for man-aging operations at the Kaesong Industrial Complex, a joint

venture between the two Koreas that was suspended in 2016 amid disagreement over the North’s nuclear and missile programmes.

South Korea spent at least 9.78bn won ($8.6m) in 2018 to renovate the building, which stood as a gleaming blue glass structure in the otherwise drab industrial city.

When it was operating, South Koreans worked on the second floor and North Koreans on the fourth floor. The third floor held conference rooms for meetings between the two sides.

When the office was closed in January, South Korea said it had 58 personnel stationed there.

On Saturday, North Korean state media reported that Kim Yo Jong, the sister of the North Korean leader and a senior official of the ruling Workers’ Party, had ordered the department in charge of inter-Korean affairs to “decisively carry out the next action”.

“Before long, a tragic scene of the useless north-south joint liaison office completely col-lapsed would be seen,” she was

reported as saying.Earlier yesterday, North

Korean state media quoted the military as saying it had been studying an “action plan” to re-enter zones that had been demilitarized under the 2018 inter-Korean pact and “turn the front line into a fortress”.

South Korea’s defence ministry called for North Korea to abide by the 2018 agreement, under which both sides vowed to cease “all hostile acts” and dismantled a number of structures along the heavily fortified Demilitarised Zone between the countries.

Members of South Korean marine corps patrol during sunset in Yeonpyeong island near the northern limited line, South Korea, yesterday.

South Korea tomove UN overwartime labourrow with Japan

ANATOLIA — ANKARA

South Korea will approach the UN over Japan’s failure to honor Korean victims of forced wartime labour at a new facility celebrating its industrial revolution, local media reported yesterday.

Seoul expressed regret that Japan’s new information center on Meiji-era industrial sites does not offer explana-tions about forced Korean labor used at the sites during the Second World War, Yonhap News Agency reported.

“We are considering sending a letter to Unesco (UN Educational Scientific and Cul-tural Organisation) to request multilateral efforts to ensure Japan faithfully delivers on its pledge and exhibits commem-orative materials for the victims at the centre,” a South Korean Foreign Ministry official said.

Without giving a confirmed timeline, the official said the ministry plans to send the letter “at the earliest date.” The devel-opment comes a day after the Foreign Ministry summoned Japan’s top envoy in Seoul to lodge a protest over the issue.

“We cannot but feel very worried and disappointed that we cannot see any kind of effort to commemorate the victims in any part of the exhibit,” the min-istry said in a statement.

The Industrial Heritage Information Center in Tokyo showcases 23 sites of Japan’s Meiji era, the nearly 45-year period from 1868-1912.

It aims to highlight Japan’s achievements in iron, steel, and coal mining during its industrial revolution.

The historic sites, which were placed on Unesco’s World Heritage list in 2015, include the notorious Hashima Island, also known as Bat-tleship Island, and six others where many Koreans were forced to work during Japan’s 1910-45 colonial rule.

Tokyo had pledged to rec-ognize “Koreans and others who were brought against their will and forced to work under harsh conditions in the 1940s at some of the sites” but failed to keep its promise, the Yonhap report said.

South Korea and Japan have long-running disputes over their wartime history and remain engaged in a pro-tracted tit-for-tat trade war.

MSF closes Kabul maternity hospital after attackAP — KABUL

Doctors Without Borders said it closed its operation yesterday in Kabul, ending years-long work to support a maternity hospital in the Afghan capital. The closure came a month after a horrific attack at the facility killed 24 people, including two infants, nurses and several young mothers.

The international charity, also known by its French acronym MSF, said it would keep its other programs in Afghanistan running, but did not go into details.

The May 12 attack at the maternity hospital set off an hours-long shootout with Afghan police and also left more than a dozen people wounded.

The hospital in Dashti Barchi, a mostly Shiite neighborhood, was the Geneva-based group’s only project in the Afghan capital.

No one claimed responsi-bility for the assault. The Taliban promptly denied involvement in the attack, which the US said bore all the hallmarks of the Islamic State group’s affiliate in Afghanistan — an attack targeting the coun-try’s minority Shiites in a neigh-borhood of Kabul that IS mili-tants have repeatedly attacked in the past.

“This was not an easy decision,” said Brian Moller, the MSF head of programs for Afghanistan. “We don’t know who is responsible for this attack, we don’t know the

rationale or intent behind the attack and we don’t know who was actively targeted, whether it was foreigners, whether it was MSF, whether it was the Hazara community or the Shiite community at large. “ Moller said the organisation still hopes that an Afghan government investigation would uncover who was behind it.

“So, given this lack of infor-mation... we have decided that it is a safer option to close this project for the time being,” Moller said.

MSF had been working at the clinic in the predominantly Hazara neighbourhood in col-laboration with the Afghan Min-istry of Public Health since 2014, providing free-of-charge maternity and neonatal care.

The group started working in Afghanistan in 1980 and con-tinues to run medical programs in the provinces of Helmand, Herat, Kandahar, Khost, and Kunduz. Other projects would continue, MSF said.

“It is going to affect a lot of people, not just our team, but also the wider community at large, in particular the com-munity that we were serving in Dasht-e-Barchi,” Moller said.

The work that the organi-zation did at the clinic affected some 1.5 million people of the area, he added. Last year, 16,000 babies were delivered at the hospital, a statistic that MSF was proud of. Now, around 130 hospital staff members funded by MSF would lose their pay.

“It is a huge impact, not just for our organization, but for the community at large,” Moller added.

The May attack in Kabul was not the worst involving MSF. In October 2015, a US Air Force AC-130 gunship repeatedly struck a well-marked Doctors Without Borders hospital, killing 30 people in the northern Afghan city of Kunduz.

At the time, US and Afghan forces were locked in a ground battle to retake the city of 300,000 from the Taliban. There were 105 patients, 140 Afghan staffers and nine inter-national staff inside, along with dozens of visitors who were caring for friends and relatives as is a custom in Afghanistan.

Staff members assists a student for a foot disinfection measure on the first day of the reopening of the International Pioneers School in Bangkok, yesterday. Some schools in Thailand have reopened as they adopted preventive measures against COVID-19.

Foot disinfection measure

Pakistan reports highest

COVID-19 deaths in a dayANATOLIA — KARACHI

Pakistan yesterday recorded the highest single-day deaths ever from the novel coronavirus, reporting 111 fatalities over the last 24 hours, the Health Ministry said. With the latest surge, the death toll in the country has reached 2,839. However, at least 4,443 new cases of the virus were reported, down from 6,825 over the past 48 hours.

With new cases over the last day, the total number of coro-navirus cases in the country reached 148,921, the data showed. Some 56,390 patients have recovered.

According to the official statistics, Pakistan has so far con-ducted 922,665 tests across the country.

Health experts see the ever-increasing coronavirus cases as a result of the lifting of a prolonged lockdown late last month, warning that the country’s already weak health system might crash soon if the tally continues to surge at the current pace.

Federal Minister for Planning Asad Umar, who is also heading the country’s anti-coronavirus strategy, on Sunday warned the COVID-19 cases could grow over one million by the end of July if the current trends persisted.

Rejecting the World Health Organization’s advice for a two-week strict lockdown across the country, Prime Minister Imran Khan said that a “smart lockdown” was the only possible option for the country in current circumstances.

Indonesia arrests US fraud fugitive on abuse chargesAFP — JAKARTA

An American fugitive wanted at home in connection with a $700m cryptocurrency scam has been arrested in Jakarta on abuse charges, Indonesian authorities said yesterday.

Russ Medlin, who entered the Southeast Asian nation on a tourist visa last year, was nabbed in the capital on Monday after three teenage girls alleged he paid to have illicit relations with them, police said.

If convicted under Indonesia’s child protection laws, Medlin could face up to 15 years in prison, police said, adding that they confiscated more than $20,000 in cash from the suspect.

“After the arrest, we checked his identity,” Jakarta police spokesman Yusri Yunus told reporters yesterday, adding Medlin was sought by foreign law enforcement agencies.

According to the Nevada State offender public website, a Russ Albert Medlin was listed as a “non compliant” tier-two offender — the second most serious — with a Las Vegas address.

US panel urges commitments from Pakistan on religious freedomAFP — WASHINGTON

A US panel called yesterday for a binding commitment from Pakistan to improving its treatment of religious minor-ities, including by tackling abuse of blasphemy laws.

The US Commission on International Religious Freedom, which advises but does not set government policy, said the United States should seek written promises in return for Pakistan exiting the State Department’s blacklist of violators.

Such a deal will “encourage the Pakistani government to take meaningful steps to address religious freedom vio-lations with defined bench-marks,” a report from the com-mission said.

Among immediate steps, Pakistan would eliminate reli-gious affiliation on identity doc-uments and start a review of all blasphemy cases.

The commission estimated that nearly 80 Pakistanis are imprisoned for blasphemy, some sentenced to die.

The report acknowledged that any such agreement was likely to meet opposition in Pakistan.

But it said that the State Department could provide incentives by imposing punitive measures on Pakistan until it reaches a deal.

The State Department in 2018 declared Pakistan to be a “country of particular concern” for religious freedom, which paves the way for sanctions and other actions if the adminis-tration chooses.

The destruction of the building represents a major setback to efforts by South Korean President Moon Jae-in to coax North Korea into cooperation.

12 WEDNESDAY 17 JUNE 2020EUROPE

Protesting French hospital workers demand better payAFP — PARIS

Hospital workers rallied in cities around France yesterday to demand better pay and more investment in the country’s public hospital system, and police fired tear gas on the side-lines of the protest march in Paris.

Although French hospitals are considered to be among the world’s best, they struggled to handle a rush of COVID-19 patients after years of cost cuts. France has reported nearly 30,000 virus-related deaths.

In Paris, largely peaceful demonstrators marched past the Invalides monument as smoke from a fire rose over the Left Bank neighbourhood. Hun-dreds of workers also rallied in the southern city of Marseille.

Even before the coronavirus crisis, the protest organizers

criticised the government’s policy of “austerity” that they say reduced resources to bare bones. They are calling for increased wages and a freeze on hospital closures and service reductions.

The government is negoti-ating with medical representa-tives after President Emmanuel Macron promised reforms.

French nurses and doctors faced off with at a leading Paris hospital last month, demanding a rethink of a once-renowned public health system that quickly became overwhelmed by tens of thousands of virus patients.

As the virus raced across France in March and satu-rated several hospitals, Macron deployed the armed forces to build the country’s first peacetime field hospital and to move patients and doctors around in military

transport jets and specially fitted high-speed trains.

The issue of stretched

hospitals predates the virus crisis. Emergency room workers held strikes and protests for

months last year demanding more hiring and funding after years of job losses.

UK begins virus vaccine trial; France pledges fundingAP — LONDON

Scientists at Imperial College London will start immunising people in Britain this week with their experimental coronavirus shot, while pharmaceutical company Sanofi and the French government announced more than €800m ($890m) in investment yesterday as part of the worldwide race to find an effective vaccine.

About a dozen vaccine candi-dates are currently in early stages of testing in thousands of people. There are no guarantees any will work but there’s increasing hope that at least some could be ready by the end of the year.

Many scientists have warned that the pandemic that has already infected at least 8 million people and killed over 437,000 worldwide might only be stopped with an effective vaccine, which typically takes years to develop.

In a statement, the British government said 300 healthy people will be immunised with two doses of the COVID-19 vaccine candidate developed at Imperial, which has been backed by £41m ($51m) in gov-

ernment funding.Robin Shattock, who is

leading the vaccine research at Imperial, said the advantage of their vaccine is the small amount required: their dose is one hundredth of the dose being tested by the NIH and Moderna Inc. That means millions of doses could be relatively quickly manufactured.

“If the UK government wants to purchase enough vaccine for the UK population, we already have that infra-structure in place to deliver that in the first two quarters of next year,” he said. Sanofi,

meanwhile, is working on a vaccine that it hopes to test on humans later this year and win approval next year. The company pledged yesterday to invest €610m ($680m) in a vaccine pro-duction site and a new vaccine research center in France, to be able to produce in greater scale and “quickly respond to future pandemic risks.”

French President Emmanuel Macron visited a Sanofi lab alongside CEO Paul Hudson, and announced €200m in gov-ernment investments to reduce France’s dependence on other countries for vaccines and other medicines. Macron said France will “relocalize” production of some drugs as part of broader government efforts to revive the virus-battered economy and bring more manufacturing pro-duction back to France.

Last month, Sanofi prompted outrage in France by promising to give the United States first access to the com-pany’s eventual vaccine, because the US had invested more in its research. Sanofi later backtracked and said it would be available in all countries.

Macron has pushed for

vaccines to be considered a “common good” for humanity that must not be subject to market pressures.

The Imperial vaccine uses synthetic strands of genetic code based on the virus. Once injected into the muscle, the

body’s own cells are instructed to make copies of a spiky protein on the coronavirus. That should in turn trigger an immune response so the body can fight off any future COVID-19 infection. Dr. Doug Brown, chief executive of the

British Society for Immunology, said the technology used by Imperial College London should theoretically lead to long-term immunity against the coronavirus but now needs to go through rig-orous testing. He was not linked to the trial.

French health workers attend a protest in front of the CHU hospital in Nantes, yesterday, as part of a nationwide day of action to urge the government to improve wages and invest in public hospitals, in the wake of coronavirus disease crisis in France.

AFP — LONDON

Britain will immediately start giving dexamethasone to coro-navirus patients, after a trial showed the steroid saved the lives of one third of the gravest cases, Health Secretary Matt Hancock said yesterday.

Hancock said Britain began stockpiling the widely available drug when its potential first became apparent three months ago.

“Because we spotted the early signs of the potential of

dexamethasone, we’ve been stockpiling it since March,” he said in a video statement.

“So we now have 200,000 courses that are ready to go and we’re working with the NHS (National Health Service) so that the NHS standard

treatment for COVID-19 will include dexamethasone form this afternoon,” Hancock said.

The research published yesterday was led by a team from the University of Oxford and partially funded by the British government.

UK to merge international development ministry and Foreign OfficeREUTERS — LONDON

Britain will merge its diplomatic and aid departments, Prime Minister Boris Johnson said yesterday, promising that a combined department would better promote British interests without cutting spending on overseas projects.

Johnson said it was removing a false divide between two overlapping departments - the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and the Department for International Development — and would allow for spending in line with foreign policy aims.

“This will unite our aid with our diplomacy and bring them together in our international effort,” he told parliament. “We already punch above our weight, this will help us to

punch even harder.” The new ministry will be called the Foreign, Commonweath and Development Office and will launch in September.

The decision was immedi-ately criticised by opponents who said it was a deliberate dis-traction from the government’s coronavirus response and would diminish Britain’s overseas influence. “The prime minister should stop these dis-tractions and get on with the job of tackling the health and eco-nomic crisis we currently face,” opposition Labour Party Leader Keir Starmer said.

Britain spent £15.2bn ($19.1bn) on “Official Devel-opment Assistance” in 2019, of which almost three-quarters came from the DFID budget, official statistics showed. The Institute for Government think

tank said the DFID budget was five times that of the foreign office.

That has long been in the sights of lawmakers on the right of Johnson’s Conservative Party, who argue that money has been wasted on frivolous projects and should either be spent in a more controlled way or spent at home. Johnson echoed those concerns, saying overseas aid had been treated for too long as “some giant cashpoint in the sky.”

Former Conservative Prime Minister David Cameron, whose coalition government wrote the pledge to spend 0.7% of gross national income on aid into law in 2015, said it would mean “less expertise, less voice for development at the top table and ultimately less respect for the UK overseas.”

German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier and his wife Elke Buedenbender showing the new contact-tracing smartphone app that will use Bluetooth short-range radio and technology standards from Apple and Google to alert people of the risk of infection with the coronavirus disease, in Berlin, Germany, yesterday.

UK coronavirus patients to get dexamethasone steroid immediately

A box of Dectancyl, a drug manufactured by Sanofi containing dexamethasone. The steroid dexamethasone has been found to save the lives of one third of the most serious COVID-19 cases, according to trial results hailed as a “major breakthrough” in the fight against the disease.

Berlin says US troops in Germany important for US, EU security

AFP — WARSAW

The presence of US troops in Germany is important for European and American security, Germany’s foreign minister said yesterday after President Donald Trump announced he would cut the number stationed there.

“We think that the US presence in Germany is important for the security not just of Germany but also for the security of the United States and especially for the security of Europe,” Heiko Maas said during a visit to Poland a day after Trump’s announcement.

Trump said he was cutting the numbers because Germany was “delinquent” in contribu-tions to NATO and had treated the United States “badly” on trade. Trump told reporters there are 52,000 US soldiers stationed in Germany and he will bring this number down to 25,000.

But according to the Pen-tagon, there are are only between 34,000 and 35,000 US soldiers permanently stationed in Germany. Rotation of units means the overall number can only temporarily top 50,000. Maas said Germany had not been given any details on when and how the redeployment might take place.

“Neither the State Department nor the Pentagon has been able to provide any information about this,” he said, adding that any changes to Europe’s security archi-tecture “definitely need to be talked about”. NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg on Tuesday also said that US troops in Europe made both sides of the Atlantic safer. Defence ministers from the alliance will discuss Trump’s plans during video talks today and tomorrow.

Musicians of the Barcelona Symphony and Catalonia National Orchestra rehearse keeping their social distance at the Barcelona’s auditorium in Barcelona, Spain, yesterday.

UK report: Racism meansminorities harder hit by virus

AP — LONDON

A new study by Public Health England has confirmed that historic racism and social inequal-ities are contributing factors that increase the risk of black, Asian and minority communities contracting and dying from the coronavirus in the UK.

Britain’s government has been under heavy pressure to do more to directly address the issue after data consistently showed that coronavirus death rates were significantly higher for blacks and ethnic minorities compared to white people.

The report, published Tuesday, didn’t look at genetic factors, but said it was clear that

the pandemic “exposed and exacerbated longstanding ine-qualities” in the country.

It said there was a strong association between economic disadvantage and COVID-19 diagnoses. Black people and minority groups are more at risk because they are more likely to live in cramped housing, use public transpor-tation and work in jobs with a higher risk of virus exposure.

It added that historic racism and poorer experiences of health care or at work meant that minority groups are less likely to seek care, or demand better protective equipment at work. “Lack of trust of NHS (National Health Service) and

healthcare treatment resulted in their reluctance to seek care on a timely basis, and late pres-entation with disease,” the paper said.

The report said officials should start more compre-hensive collection of ethnicity health data and ensure ethnicity is recorded in death certificates. It also recommended targeted messaging on smoking, obesity and improving management of common health conditions like diabetes.

It came a day after Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced a commission to look at what more can be done to fight racial inequality in the UK.

The British government said 300 healthy people will be immunised with two doses of the COVID-19 vaccine candidate developed at Imperial, which has been backed by £41m ($51m) in government funding.

Germany launches tracing app

Adhering to social distancing rule

13WEDNESDAY 17 JUNE 2020 EUROPE

Hungary MPs approve end of controversial emergency virus powersAFP — BUDAPEST

Hungarian MPs voted yesterday to revoke anti-coronavirus emergency powers that trig-gered international criticism amid fears of a power grab by Prime Minister Viktor Orban.

Dominated by Orban’s ruling Fidesz party, parliament voted by 192 votes to none to request the government lift the “state of danger” and related special powers put in place to tackle the COVID-19 crisis.

The government is now expected to formally lift the state of danger later this week.

However, MPs also approved a bill which according to critics would also enable the government to declare another so-called “state of medical crisis” and rule by decree in future, potentially for an indef-inite period.

Several prominent gov-ernment-critical NGOs have warned in a joint statement that the revocation of the special powers is an “optical illusion” leaving the authorities with enhanced powers.

A “coronavirus protection act” adopted by parliament on March 30 had enabled the cabinet to rule by decree until

it decided to end the state of danger.

Orban, who implemented a relatively early lockdown to halt the spread of the virus, said that ruling by decree allowed him to respond quickly and effec-tively during the emergency.

Hungary’s population of almost 10 million has been lightly affected in comparison with other parts of Europe, reporting just over 4,000 infec-tions of the novel coronavirus and around 560 deaths.

But critics at home and abroad who warned that the law had no time limit and was vulnerable to abuse accused Orban of using the crisis to steer EU member Hungary toward authoritarianism.

In April the European Par-liament approved a statement saying Hungary’s measures

were “incompatible with European values”.

Governments that used the crisis to mount executive power grabs would be “politically dan-gerous, and morally unac-ceptable,” said Donald Tusk, leader of Europe’s EPP conserv-ative political grouping, to which Fidesz also belongs.

Budapest dismissed the crit-icism as “fake news” and said the legislation was propor-tionate and could be rescinded at any time by parliament or reviewed by the constitutional court.

Previously when looking forward to the end of emer-gency powers, Orban has said that critics “will get a chance to apologise to Hungary for unfounded accusations about the law”.

Hungarian opposition

parties and rights groups at home and abroad called the extra powers “dictatorial” and said Orban abused them to cement his rule rather than combat the virus.

They feared the powers would feed into the whittling away at independent institu-tions since Orban came to power in 2010 and launched a centralisation drive that has transformed the judiciary, media landscape, and education system among other sectors.

Some of the more than 100 decrees issued since April stripped opposition-run munic-ipalities of power and finances.

The emergency powers also included potential jail terms for

“scaremongering” over the pan-demic, sparking concern for press freedom and freedom of speech.

Police opened more than 100 cases of suspected scare-mongering and temporarily detained several people, although no cases came to court.

Agoston Mraz, director of the Nezopont Institute in Budapest, which is seen as close to the government, said that “Orban realised that he can profit from the false criticism on the international stage and he used the situation”.

“Now he is the absolute winner, in Hungary a large majority is satisfied with his

crisis management, while abroad he won his fight against the critics,” he said.

However, according to a note from the Political Capital research firm “the government exploited the opportunities created by the special legal order and the political envi-ronment to the fullest extent”.

Changes ushered in by Orban’s government during the pandemic and which will remain in place weaken con-stitutional and parliamentary control over the government, while new financial measures increase the influence of Orban’s oligarch allies at the expense of opposition-led municipalities, said the note.

Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orban (right) with Slovakia’s Prime Minister Igor Matovic during a joint news conference in Budapest, Hungary.

North Macedonia declares state of emergency ahead of voteAP — SKOPJE

North Macedonia’s president has declared an eight-day state of emergency ahead of an early national election after the coun-try’s main political leaders agreed the vote will be held on July 15.

President Stevo Pen-darovski issued the decree on Monday and it came into force immediately.

His office said the decision will allow authorities make the

necessary preparations to ensure public health is pro-tected during the campaign and voting amid the corona-virus pandemic.

The early election had ini-tially been planned for April but was delayed after the virus first appeared in North Mace-donia in late February.

Parliament was dissolved in February and a caretaker government was sworn in to prepare for the early election.

Until Monday, the leader of

the governing Social Demo-crats, Zoran Zaev, and the con-servative opposition had failed to agree on a new date despite repeated efforts.

Zaev reached the agreement on Monday with opposition leader Hristijan Mickoski, head of the conserv-ative VMRO-DPMNE party.

The tiny Balkan country is grappling wi th another spike of infections after lockdown restrictions were relaxed last month.

Heal th author i t ies announced 103 new confirmed cases on Monday and five deaths, bringing the total number of cases to 4,157 and the death toll to 193 in this country of around 2 million people.

“These elections will be unusual in a way that there will be no ordinary election cam-paign,” Parliament speaker Talat Xhaferi said in a statement. He said all citizens must adhere “in the most dis-

ciplined way” to health author-ities’ recommendations.

Politics in North Macedonia has been rocked for years by successive scandals, allegations of corruption and by a heated dispute over an agreement with southern neighbour Greece that saw the country change its name last year from Macedonia. In return, Greece, which has a northern province named Macedonia, dropped its objections to the country’s accession to Nato .

Ukraine President’s

wife hospitalised

with coronavirusAP — UKRAINE

The wife of Ukrainain Pres-ident Volodymyr Zelenskiy has been hospitalised with double pneumonia after contracting the new coronavirus, joining the ranks of several first ladies around the world who got infected with COVID-19 earlier this year.

Zelenskiy’s office said in a statement yesterday that Olena Zelenska’s condition was stable and the president himself and the couple’s children tested negative for the virus on Monday.

Zelenska, 42, said she tested positive for the virus on Friday. In an Instagram post that day, she said she “felt good,” was receiving outpa-tient treatment and isolated herself from her family “in order not to put them in danger.”

Zelenskiy, also 42, has limited his contacts to a “very small circle” of people and started conducting meetings and talks via teleconference, but continued going to the office, as some of his duties can’t be fulfilled remotely, the president’s spokeswoman Yuliia Mendel told the Ukrainska Pravda news outlet.

Zelenska is one of a few first ladies who have con-tracted the virus. In mid-March, the wife of Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau tested positive for the virus. Trudeau and the couple’s children didn’t experience any symptoms of the disease and the prime minister isolated himself for two weeks. Sophie Grégoire Trudeau recovered from the disease in about two weeks.

Moscow reopens museums as it rolls back virus curbsREUTERS — MOSCOW

Muscovites returned to museums and restaurant terraces yesterday for the first time in more than two months as the Russian capital rolled back more coronavirus curbs despite still recording over 1,000 new infections daily.

Libraries and zoos in the city of nearly 13 million people were also reopening, albeit with limits on numbers.

Dentists were getting back to business too and sports events were allowed, though venues had 10 percent capacity limits.

Kremlin critics have accused the authorities of lifting restric-tions too fast to pave the way for a nationwide vote on reforms that would allow President Vladimir Putin to run again for president twice after 2024 when his current term ends.

Voting will take place over a seven-day period, culminating

on July 1. The Kremlin has denied decisions to ease curbs were politically motivated.

Moscow began to lift its lockdown last week, allowing residents to leave homes and use public transport and vehicles without restrictions.

City mayor Sergei Sobyanin said on Monday it was time to further ease restrictions because the pandemic was on the wane and pressure on the city’s health system was easing.

In central Moscow yes-terday, restaurant owners were eagerly tidying up their terraces but remained wary about the impact on sales of having to serve fewer customers.

“The restaurant economy revolves around seats,” said Dmitry Nesterenko, general manager of Laduree Russia, a branch of the French luxury bakery.

A restaurant quarter near Moscow’s Belorusskaya train

stations that caters for office workers was doing a brisk trade yesterday lunchtime with its ter-races full of people eating in the sunshine.

Other terraces in the city were less full though, and some restaurants were still in the

process of erecting wooden pavement terraces.

Moscow has been the worst-affected area in Russia, which has the third highest number of cases in the world with more than half a million infections.

Moscow has recorded

208,680 cases and 3,386 deaths, while the nation as a whole has registered 7,284 deaths — fewer than numerous other countries.

Critics are dubious about the accuracy of Russia’s mortality figures.

People queue up to enter the Moscow Zoo, in Moscow, yesterday, after it reopened as the Russian capital continues to loosen anti-coronavirus restrictions.

Armenia detains dozens of opposition protestersAFP — YEREVAN

Armenian police yesterday detained more than 100 supporters of an opposition leader accused of financial crimes ahead of a vote in parliament to strip him of immunity from prosecution.

Supporters of Gagik Tsarukyan, oligarch and the leader of the largest opposition party, Prosperous Armenia, blocked several streets in the capital Yerevan with trucks and buses and staged a rally outside parliament.

Police spokesman Ashot Aharonyan said that 103 pro-testers were detained.

Mass gatherings are cur-rently banned in Armenia due to a state of emergency imposed to slow the spread of the coro-navirus pandemic.

The protest came after pros-ecutors said yesterday they will seek to hold Tsarukyan in pre-trial detention. The vote in par-liament to strip him of his immunity was expected to be held later yesterday.

Armenia’s national security service on Sunday searched Tsarukyan’s house and his party’s offices as part of an investigation into “financial crimes.” Tsarukyan is suspected of running an “illegal gambling business that has deprived the

state coffers of some $60m” and of “vote buying” during 2017 parliamentary elections, the security service has said.

More than 90 of Tsarukyan’s supporters were briefly detained on Sunday during protests.

Tsarukyan told journalists over the weekend that the accu-sations against him were “polit-ically motivated” and aimed at silencing his criticism of Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan’s han-dling of the coronavirus pandemic.

Armenia has a fast-growing outbreak with a total of 17,489 infections.

Pashinyan’s government has come under fire for responding

too slowly to the pandemic, which has overwhelmed hos-pitals and seen quarantine rules ignored. Pashinyan, who enjoys widespread popularity in Armenia, said earlier this month he had recovered from the virus after he and his family tested positive.

He came to power in 2018 after mass popular protests he led against veteran leader Serzh Sarkisian and his Republican Party.

He has since led a relentless crusade against graft and ini-tiated sweeping judicial reforms.

Tsarukyan’s party controls 25 seats in Armenia’s 132-member parliament.

Russian police injured in clashes with

Azeris stranded by virus travel curbs

REUTERS — MOSCOW

Seven Russian police officers were injured in clashes with around 400 Azeri nationals stuck in southern Russia due to coronavirus-related travel restrictions, authorities said yesterday.

The violence broke out late on Monday near a tent encampment in the Caspian Sea region of Dagestan, which borders Azerbaijan, after the Azeris being accommodated there learnt that only some of them would be able to return home in coming days.

Russia, which has registered the world’s third largest tally of coronavirus cases, closed its borders in March and special arrangements have had to be made for most foreigners wanting to be repatriated.

The Azeris were told only 120 of them would be able to return home in coming days, the TASS news agency quoted a local official, Fuad Shikhiev, as saying. They then tried to block a main road and threw rocks and other objects at police, injuring seven and damaging five vehicles, the Investigative Committee — the branch of law enforcement that investi-gates major crimes — said in a statement.

Dominated by Orban’s ruling Fidesz party, parliament voted by 192 votes to none to request the government lift the 'state of danger' and related special powers put in place to tackle the COVID-19 crisis. The government is now expected to formally lift the state of danger later this week.

14 WEDNESDAY 17 JUNE 2020AMERICAS

Trump signs order on police reform

REUTERS — WASHINGTON

President Donald Trump, facing criticism that his policies and inflammatory rhetoric have aggravated a racial divide in the United States, signed an order yesterday that he said would reform police practices while maintaining “law and order.”

After weeks of protests against racism and policy bru-tality prompted by the death of George Floyd, a black man killed on May 25 in police custody in Minneapolis, Trump sought to offer a policy response to rising concerns about racial injustice going into the November 3 election, in which he is seeking a second term.

Trump, a Republican, opened his remarks by expressing sympathy to the families of victims of police vio-lence, pledging to fight for justice and promising them their loved ones will not have died in vain. But he quickly pivoted to a call for a return to “law and order” and a threat of penalties to looters.

“Americans want law and order, they demand law and order,” Trump said at a cer-emony in the White House Rose Garden, reiterating a call that has angered protesters who have poured onto streets from New York to Los Angeles.

In his public comments and

on Twitter, Trump has called for crackdowns on protesters and emphasised a forceful and mil-itarised response to the social unrest sparked by the death of Floyd and others. Opinion polls show widespread concerns among Americans about police brutality. Yesterday’s order encourages police departments to employ the latest standards for use of force, improve infor-mation sharing so that officers with poor records are not hired without their backgrounds being known and add social workers to law enforcement responses to non-violent cases involving drug addiction and homelessness, officials said.

Trump’s proposal would steer federal dollars to police departments that get inde-pendent certification by outside bodies and would ban choke-holds unless an officer’s life was in danger. It also would encourage them to use less-lethal weapons such as stun guns. Trump reiterated that he opposes calls to “defund the police” by reimagining or dis-mantling police departments. Leading Democrats, including presumptive presidential nominee Joe Biden, have not embraced such calls, but Republicans have jumped on the issue.

The Democratic-led House of Representatives is expected

to vote later this month on sweeping legislation put forward by the Congressional Black Caucus to rein in police misconduct.

Senate Republicans are expected to unveil their own legislation today that concen-trates more on data collection than on policy changes in areas involving lethal force. Trump urged Congress to act.

Democrats want to allow victims of misconduct and their families to sue police, an idea that Republicans oppose. Republicans, meanwhile, are pushing to reduce job protec-tions for members of law

enforcement unions.Trump’s decision to ban

chokeholds appears similar to the ban included in the Demo-cratic legislation, known as the Justice in Policing Act.

Up to now, Republican law-makers have had a mixed response on the issue, with some saying they are willing to support a ban and others con-tending that such issues should be left to local jurisdictions.

Attorney General William Barr, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and Senator Tim Scott, who is developing the Republican legislation, attended yesterday’s White House

signing. One civil rights group said Trump’s action did not go far enough.

“While the order takes some steps forward, it is an inade-quate response to a nation demanding sweeping, bold action,” Vanita Gupta, head of the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, said in a statement.

Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer said in a statement: “This executive order will not deliver the compre-hensive meaningful change and accountability in our nation’s police departments that Amer-icans are demanding.”

US President Donald Trump listens to applause after signing an executive order on police reform during a ceremony in the Rose Garden at the White House, in Washington, yesterday.

US House panel to

hold poll-security

hearing with

Facebook, Google

and TwitterREUTERS — WASHINGTON

Top officials from Facebook Inc, Alphabet Inc’s Google and Twitter Inc will appear before US lawmakers tomorrow at a hearing on foreign influence and election security, the House of Representatives Intelligence Committee announced yesterday.

The remote hearing will discuss the technology indus-try’s actions since the 2016 US elections, state-sponsored dis-information efforts, and other related issues as the country moves toward the November 3 presidential contest, the panel said. The hearing will also look at misinformation campaigns amid the novel coronavirus out-break and recent protests over racism and policing.

The witnesses include Nath-aniel Gleicher, Facebook’s head of security policy; Nick Pickles, director of Global Public Policy Strategy and Development at Twitter, and Richard Salgado, director for Law Enforcement and Information Security at Google. The hearing comes as Americans are increasingly skeptical about social media companies’ ability to make the right decisions about what should be allowed on their plat-forms, and trust the government even less to make those choices.

The debate over content moderation has intensified as Twitter and Facebook diverged on how to handle inflammatory posts by President Donald Trump, who in turn has accused social media companies of censorship.

Bolton will break the law if he publishes book: TrumpREUTERS — WASHINGTON

US President Donald Trump said on Monday his former national security adviser John Bolton (pictured) will have broken the law and face criminal liability if a book he has written about his time in the White House is published.

Trump told reporters that Bolton knows he has classified information in his book, and that he had not completed a clearing process required for any book written by former government officials who had a c c e s s t o s e n s i t i v e information.

“I will consider every con-versation with me as president highly classified. So that would mean that if he wrote a book and if the book gets out, he’s

broken the law,” Trump said.“That’s called criminal lia-

bility. That’s a big thing,” Trump added.

Attorney General William Barr, speaking at the same event, said the Justice Department was trying to get Bolton to complete the

clearance process and “make the necessary deletions of clas-sified information.” Trump fired Bolton in September after 519 days on the job amid simmering differences on a wide array of foreign policy issues.

Bolton’s The Room Where It Happened: A White House Memoir, is set to be published on June 23.

The publisher, Simon and Schuster, said in a news release on Friday the book provides an insider account of Trump’s “inconsistent, scattershot decision-making process.” The book details Trump’s dealings with China, Russia, Ukraine, North Korea, Iran, Britain, France and Germany, the publisher said.

“This is the book Donald Trump doesn’t want you to read,” Simon and Schuster said.

Ben Wizner, director of the American Civil Liberties Union’s Speech, Privacy, and Tech-nology Project, said the effort to block the book’s publication was doomed to fail.

“As usual, the government’s threats have nothing to do with safeguarding national security, and everything to do with avoiding scandal and embar-rassment,” Wizner said.

Trump said the problem of publishing classified infor-mation including conversations with the president “becomes even worse if he lies about the conversation, which I under-stand he might have in some cases.” He said he had not read the book.

“So we’ll see what happens. They’re in court, or they’ll soon be in court,” Trump said.

COVID-19 cases surging in Alabama, South Carolina and OklahomaREUTERS — WASHINGTON

New cases of COVID-19 nearly doubled in Alabama and South Carolina in the second week of June compared to the prior seven days, an analysis found, as 17 US states reported weekly increases in the spread of the novel coronavirus.

Alabama’s new cases rose 97 percent to 5,115 for the week ended June 14, with 14 percent of COVID-19 tests coming back positive compared to 6 percent in the prior week, according to the analysis of data from The COVID Tracking Project, a vol-unteer-run effort to track the outbreak.

New cases in South Carolina rose 86 percent to 4,509, while the positive test rate rose to about 14 percent from 9 percent over the same period, according to the analysis and state data.

When asked to comment on the increases, South Carolina and Alabama health officials said some residents were not fol-lowing recommendations to maintain social distance, avoid large gatherings and wear a mask in public. In Oklahoma, where President Donald Trump plans to hold an indoor cam-paign rally on Saturday, new cases rose 68 percent to 1,081 in

the second week of June, while the positive test rate increased to 4 percent, from 2 percent the previous week. Oklahoma offi-cials did not immediately respond to requests for comment. The three states are among hot spots throughout the South and Southwest that helped push the total number of new infections in the United States up 1% in the week ended June 14, the second increase after five weeks of declines.

The state that reported the largest number of new cases was California at 20,043, up 10 percent from the previous week.

Nationally, the rate of pos-itive tests has hovered around 5 percent for several weeks, according to the analysis. More than 583,000 tests were reported in a single day last week, a new record.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has recommended states wait for new COVID-19 cases to fall for 14 days before easing social dis-tancing restrictions.

Seventeen states and the Dis-trict of Columbia have met that criteria, the analysis showed. Pennsylvania and New York lead with nine straight weeks of declines, followed by Rhode Island and Indiana.

Deeper probe launched into deaths of two black men in CaliforniaREUTERS — LOS ANGELES

The deaths of two black men found hanged from trees 10 days and 80km apart in Cali-fornia, one in a municipal park, gained deeper scrutiny on Monday amid a public outcry that authorities were ready to prematurely rule both cases suicides.

Law enforcement officials acknowledged on Monday facing a furore of suspicion from com-munity members surrounding the two hangings in light of heightened discontent with racial injustice aroused by George Floyd’s death at the hands of police in Minneapolis last month.

Los Angeles County Sheriff Alex Villenueva and his coun-terpart in neighbouring San Ber-nardino County, John McMahon, said separately they would work in cooperation with investigators from the California attorney gen-eral’s office.

Villenueva said the FBI would provide additional oversight of his department’s probe — con-stituting the more recent and highly visible of the two cases.

The body of Robert Fuller, 24, was found hanging from a tree

by a rope around his neck before dawn last Wednesday by para-medics called to Poncitlan Square, a park about a block from City Hall in the high-desert town of Palmdale, some 48km north of Los Angeles.

During a televised com-munity meeting two days later, officials said it appeared Fuller had taken his own life — drawing an angry response and chants of “Speak the truth” and “No peace.”

Villanueva said his office had since been flooded with phone calls and email queries.

The social media hashtag #JusticeforRobertFuller was trending on Twitter last week, with users calling for a full inves-tigation of what some speculated was a cover-up of a lynching.

At news conference on Monday with the sheriff, the county’s chief medical examiner, Dr Jonathan Lucas, said the pre-liminary assessment of apparent suicide had been based on a lack of any immediate evidence pointing to foul play.

“But we felt it prudent to roll that back and continue to look deeper,” Lucas said.

Adding to the mystery was the lack of anything near the body, such as a ladder, stool or chair, that could have been used to elevate Fuller before a hanging, authorities said.

“There was nothing else found at the scene, other than the rope which was used to hang the victim and the contents of his pocket as well as a backpack that

he was wearing,” Captain Kent Wegener, head of the sheriff’s homicide squad, told reporters.

Villanueva said his investi-gators would confer with the San Bernardino County sheriff’s office on the death of Malcolm Harsch, 37, who was found hanged from a tree at a homeless encampment about 50 miles east of Palmdale in Victorville, California, on May 31. Officials there said Harsch’s death likewise appeared to be a suicide. But authorities are con-tinuing an investigation.

Separate autopsies of the two men were performed on Friday, but final conclusions were awaiting toxicology results and further inquiry by homicide detectives, officials from both counties said.

Healthcare workers attend a vigil against systemic racism and police brutality, amid the coronavirus disease outbreak, in Los Angeles, California, yesterday.

US narrowing support to seven COVID-19 vaccine candidatesREUTERS — WASHINGTON

The Trump administration aims to narrow its financial support to about seven experimental coronavirus vaccines from the 14 it has been working with so far, the US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) said yesterday.

US government officials also said that they expect many Amer-icans to get an approved vaccine to prevent COVID-19 at no charge once it begins distribution, potentially in January.

“For any American who is vulnerable, who cannot afford the vaccines, and desires the vaccine, we will provide it for free,” a US government official said during a call with reporters, requesting anonymity.

The official also said that based on conversations with commercial health insurers, it expects a vaccine to be covered with no out-of-pocket costs, similar to coverage policies insurers have put in place for COVID-19 related medical services.

“We will be working with insurers,” the official said.The Trump Administration last month launched “Operation Warp

Speed” — a joint HHS and Department of Defence programme — to accelerate development of coronavirus vaccines, treatments and diagnostics. The effort has “maximised the possibility” of having a vaccine before year end, the government official said.

After weeks of protests against racism and policy brutality prompted by the death of George Floyd, a black man killed on May 25 in police custody in Minneapolis, Trump sought to offer a policy response to rising concerns about racial injustice going into the November 3 election, in which he is seeking a second term.

15WEDNESDAY 17 JUNE 2020 AMERICAS

Venezuela court orders takeover of leading opposition party

AP — CARACAS

Venezuela’s high court, loyal to President Nicolás Maduro, has ordered the takeover of one of the nation’s oldest and most influential political parties, which is now opposed to the socialist government.

The ruling by the Supreme Court on Monday suspended and replaced Democratic Action’s board of directors in what it called a “necessary restructuring process.”

A once-wealthy oil nation, Venezuela is in a deepening political and economic crisis after two decades of socialist rule that has driven mass migration and scarcities of basic goods. The US

and scores of other nations con-sider Maduro’s government ille-gitimate and recognise congres-sional leader Juan Guaidó as interim president.

Henry Ramos Allup, the leader of Democratic Action, said he would not abide by the court’s ruling. A political ally of Guaidó, Allup accused Maduro of “hijacking” the party.

“Democratic Action is going to resist these acts of shame-lessness,” Allup said. “Nicolás Maduro has ordered the symbols of Democratic Action to be put

into the hands of the corrupt.”The court days earlier seated

a new elections council ahead of a vote expected this year in a battle for control of the National Assembly, the only branch of government Maduro doesn’t control.

The unilateral appointments to the council were especially disheartening to some moderate opponents of Maduro who had been trying to reach an accord with the government for minimal guarantees for a free and fair vote. The new National Electoral

Council includes names of members of Democratic Action, who Allup said he does not recognize.

Democratic Action, which was formed in the 1930s, is among the Venezuela’s four most powerful opposition parties. They also include Guaidó’s Popular Will along with Justice First and A New Time. Officials have not set a date for the election, which is required this year by the nation’s constitution. Allup accused Maduro’s government of acting acting in bad faith.

A file photo of Venezuela President Nicolas Maduro (centre), his wife Cilia Flores, and President of Supreme Court, Maikel Moreno, attending a ceremony, in Caracas, Venezuela.

US extends non-essential travel restrictions with Canada and MexicoREUTERS — NEW YORK

The Trump administration said yesterday it would extend existing restrictions on non-essential travel at land ports of entry with Canada and Mexico due to continued risks from the novel coronavirus pandemic.

“This extension protects Americans while keeping essential trade and travel flowing as we reopen the American economy,” US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Acting Secretary Chad Wolf said in a statement, without specifying an end date to the extension.

The travel restrictions had already been extended several times and were set to expire on June 23, according to a related US government notice. A DHS official said the latest extension would run for 30 days.

Mexico’s foreign ministry said in a tweet on Tuesday that the travel restrictions across the country’s border with the United States would continue for 30 days.

The United States said it was in “close contact” with both countries on its northern and southern borders about the restrictions, which were first imposed in mid-March. The

Trump administration had already extended indefinitely a separate set of pandemic-related rules that permit rapid deportation of migrants caught at U.S. borders.

Separately, the US Department of Justice yesterday said in a statement it was again postponing hearings for thou-sands of migrants who have been waiting in Mexico for US immigration court hearings.

The Justice Department, which runs the immigration court system, said the hearings for those in the so-called Migrant Protection Protocols program would be on hold until July 20.

“This will alleviate the need for travel within Mexico to a US port of entry while pandemic conditions in Mexico remain severe,” the Justice Department said.

The controversial program has stranded migrants - many of them seeking asylum in the United States - in Mexico for months.

Hundreds have been living in squalid tent camps near the US-Mexico border, which health experts and immigration advocates have said leaves them vulnerable to coronavirus infections.

Brazil police raid Bolsonaro backers in probe of ralliesREUTERS — BRASILIA

Brazilian police raided the homes and offices of President Jair Bolsonaro’s allies on yesterday as part of an investi-gation into the financing of anti-democratic rallies in support of the right-wing leader.

Bolsonaro’s supporters have taken to the streets almost weekly to challenge coronavirus lockdowns and call for military intervention to close Congress and the Supreme Court, which they see as obstacles to his agenda.

Bolsonaro, a former army captain and apologist for Bra-zil’s 1964 military coup, has attended several of the demon-strations, but he is not a target of the federal police investigation.

The president’s escalating confrontations with the Supreme Court come as Brazil suffers the world’s worst COVID-19 outbreak outside the United States, which has killed some 44,000 people.

Bolsonaro’s handling of the health crisis has drawn criticism from health experts as he min-imised the severity of the disease, sidelined specialists and challenged social distancing orders from governors and mayors. Among those targeted by 21 search warrants yesterday were federal lawmaker Daniel Silveira and conservative blogger Allan dos Santos, both of them said on social media.

Chile says accounting errors led to omission of 31,000 virus casesREUTERS — SANTIAGO

A rash of accounting glitches in Chile led to the omission of more than 31,000 confirmed coronavirus cases, or nearly one-sixth of the country’s total so far, health officials said yesterday.

The cases, discovered during a review of the health ministry’s databases, stemmed back to mid-March, when the outbreak began in Chile, authorities said.

“We have detected that there is a significant number of people who have not been notified or whose status has not been processed and continues to be ‘pending,’” Dr Rafael Araos, a member of an expert committee advising the government, told reporters in a briefing.

“This group of unreported cases... have positive PCR (exams) and thus constitute confirmed cases,” he saida.

The accounting confusion comes as cases are soaring in the South American nation, averaging over 5,000 daily. On Tuesday, Chile reported a total of 184,449 infections and 3,383 deaths from the disease. The additional 31,412 cases discovered by authorities will be added to Chile’s total tally on Wednesday, Araos said.

As the pandemic has worsened in Chile, health ministry statistics have come under increasing scrutiny.

Last week, a controversy over the reporting of coronavirus-related deaths led President Sebastian Pinera to replace Health Minister Jaime Manalich, a close friend and confidant.

Manalich, who had overseen Chile’s response to the outbreak until now, won praise for an aggressive campaign to keep hospitals supplied with ventilators and protective equipment but was criti-cised for successive criteria changes for recording deaths and cases

Mexico begins reopening even as COVID-19 cases, deaths remain highAP — MEXICO CITY

Mexico began more re-openings of businesses shut down due to the coronavirus pandemic, even as deaths and new cases continued at an unbroken pace.

The Health Department said total confirmed cases rose by 3,427 to 150,264, and confirmed deaths rose by 439 to 17,580. Both numbers are clearly undercounts.

Federal health officials have said Mexico is on a sort of a plateau and there is no clear evi-dence of any sustained decrease in cases. But President Andrés Manuel López Obrador said on Monday that greater Mexico City, which has been worst-hit by the coronavirus, was seeing “a slight decrease, not as much as we would like, but it is now declining.”

The new numbers came on

Monday as officials in Baja Cal-ifornia Sur announced a partial re-opening of tourist resorts. Cancun already partly reopened last week.

The tourism secretary of Baja California Sur, Luis Hum-berto Araiza, trumpeted Monday that the state’s tourism industry “is back,” even though hotels, restaurants and beaches will be allowed to operate at only 30 percent capacity.

In the Baja California Sur resort of Los Cabos, beaches began opening Monday with limited hours. Police officers sta-tioned at the El Medano beach Cabo San Lucas told the first bathers “please maintain your distance,” as the sandy expanse opened from 10 a.m. to 6pm.

Some sunbathers were scat-tered over the resort’s most popular beach, though nothing like the times before the coro-

navirus pandemic.More importantly for the

economy of the twin resorts, res-taurants were allowed to open as were sports fishing charters, but with capacity restriction.

“People should continue complying with sanitary measure like face masks, using hand sanitising gel, keeping a safe distance and taking temper-atures outside businesses,” said

Los Cabos Health Director Adán Monroy. However, local union leader Esteban Vargas Juárez said only about 35 percent of the resort’s tourism employees were back at work.

People wearing protective masks walk past the turnstiles inside a subway station after the city government lifted restrictions on car traffic and public transport, in Mexico City, yesterday.

US accuses Maduro of seeking to rig upcoming voteREUTERS — CARACAS

The US government on Monday accused Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro of “illegally” installing a new national elec-toral council to oversee parlia-mentary elections due to take place later this year.

Venezuela’s Supreme Court, which is dominated by Maduro loyalists, named the council last week. Opposition leader Juan

Guaido called the electoral body “false” and said the opposition would not recognise it.

Venezuela’s constitution grants the power to appoint electoral council members to the National Assembly, which Guaido leads, but the Supreme Court ruled that the legislature had failed to do so.

The United States and most other Western countries rec-ognize Guaido as Venezuela’s

rightful leader, though Maduro still controls the state.

US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, in a statement, said Maduro was manipulating Ven-ezuela’s constitution and the new council would fail to implement the conditions required to hold free and fair elections.

“Without following this process, elections that represent the will of the people are

impossible,” Pompeo said. “This step by the regime and its Supreme Court takes Venezuela even further away from a dem-ocratic transition.”

In a statement late on Sunday, Guaaido’s opposition coalition said the conditions did not exist for elections to take place guaranteeing trans-parency, trust and public freedoms, including a “trust-worthy” election council.

The new council held its first session on Monday, state television showed, though it did not give any details on the upcoming electoral process.

The supreme court on Monday night issued a ruling that named new leaders to opposition party Democratic Action, a move the opposition denounced as an effort to cripple Maduro’s adversaries in the upcoming vote.

Colombia’s beleaguered President getsapproval bump during pandemicREUTERS — BOGOTA

The coronavirus pandemic has battered the popularity of governments and leaders around the world, yet Colom-bia’s Ivan Duque has actually received an unexpected boost in public opinion.

With unprecedented media exposure during the pandemic, the president’s approval rating more than doubled from 23 percent in February to 52 percent by the end of April. Fighting the outbreak has allowed him to shift his govern-ment’s focus from social unrest and accusations of corruption.

But politicians and analysts predicted that when the crisis ends, Duque’s popularity will fall again under renewed pressure from unions, students and opposition politicians in a

country where the pandemic has worsened existing social and economic challenges.

Just days after Colombia reported its first case of COVID-19 in early March, Duque declared a state of emer-gency, allowing him to issue decrees without congressional approval.

The state of emergency and subsequent quarantine declared to control the spread of coro-navirus threw water on twin political fires of social unrest and a scandal over alleged vote buying by a rancher accused of having links to drug traffickers.

Since the pandemic’s arrival, Duque has appeared on tele-vision each night, allowing him to flex his independence and muting criticism that he was a mere errand boy carrying out

orders of his political mentor, ex-president Alvaro Uribe.

“He’s demonstrated that he is capable of governing without needing his hand held,” said German Varon, a senator for centrist party Radical Change.

The pandemic has changed Duque’s agenda in Colombia’s congress, Varon said, where the government has allocated mil-lions of dollars in subsidies to poor people and to businesses to mitigate the economic impact of the quarantine.

Previously, Duque’s gov-ernment was focused on bills to modernise the country’s justice and electoral system and trying to push through unpopular pension and labor reforms.

While pension changes look to eliminate the highest retirement subsidies, labor

reform would allow companies to hire workers by the hour, a move opposed by unions and a large section of congress.

Varon said Duque will not be able to maintain his current popularity during an economic recession and rising unemployment.

“It won’t be easy. His pop-ularity and support are fragile and if the pandemic and its effects aren’t properly managed, people will feel endangered and those gains will be lost,” Varon said.

Rising cases of COVID-19 also could tarnish Duque’s image, warned Sergio Guzman, an analyst at Colombia Risk Analysis, despite the fact Colombia has fewer cases and deaths than neighbouring coun-tries like Brazil, Ecuador, Peru and Chile.

The ruling by the Supreme Court on Monday suspended and replaced Democratic Action’s board of directors in what it called a ‘necessary restructuring process’.

16 WEDNESDAY 17 JUNE 2020MORNING BREAK

Group exercise for a cause Members of the Peruvian Armed Forces organise group exercises for people queueing outside a bank to collect government aid, in the Amazon city of Iquitos, in the Peruvian Loreto region, yesterday, amid the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.

Belgium revives hunt for 1980s supermarket killersAFP — BRUSSELS

Belgian police yesterday released an old photo of a man carrying a military assault weapon, to try to solve the decades-old mystery of the country’s bloodiest series of murders.

Known as the “Crazy Brabant Killers”, the assailants killed 28 shoppers and wounded hundreds more in attacks on supermarket car parks in the Brussels area between 1982 and 1985.

Photographed in a forest, the man is wearing dark glasses and a military-style shirt and trousers and holds a semi-auto-matic combat shotgun made by Italian brand Franchi.

Federal investigators who

took over the case more than two years ago are “committed to start from scratch”, said spokesman Eric Van Duyse. The call for witnesses was part of that process, he added.

A tipster who claimed the man was “very important” handed over the photo to

investigators in 1986, but never said anything more and nothing came of it, Duyse said.

Over the decades, investi-gators have considered various theories, including that the group was part of an attempt by the far left or far right to undermine the state.

The gang’s equipment and ability in handling weapons raised suspicions at the time that there was a link to the Belgian security forces.

Investigators have also looked for links to local shooting clubs.

Van Duyse said investi-gators were taking another look at 3,000 names mentioned in the massive case file and had begun DNA testing for hundreds of them.

Nobel-winning economist warns virus could worsen inequalityAFP — LONDON

The coronavirus outbreak has exposed existing inequalities but without reform, argues Nobel prize-winning economist Angus Deaton, it also risks making them much worse.

In an interview with AFP, the Scottish-born Princeton professor called for changes to the US healthcare system and the power of the country’s big tech firms.

“Someone compared the pandemics to an X-ray machine that makes the ine-qualities already there much more trans-parent,” the 75-year-old said.

“The educated people, most of us have jobs we can continue to do almost the same way, we talk to people on Zoom and we get paid just the same.” But those with less formal education are often “essential workers (who) risk their lives with COVID. Or if they are in non-essential things, they might lose their jobs”.

In the United States, death rates have risen for those without a university degree and are going down for those with one, he says.

In addition, “mortality rates from

COVID are much higher for African Americans than they are for whites”.

He said these factors could not have predicted the wave of protests that have swept the US following the death of George Floyd.

“But I nor you can say it has nothing to do with COVID,” he said.

Deaton, who won the Nobel prize in 2015, is lauded for his insights into poverty and health issues — and he sees this as a key area for change.

He expressed hope that the outbreak

will finally force reform of US healthcare, as “people will realise that this is just not possible anymore”.

“When people lost their jobs they lost their medical insurance,” he said.

“There are a huge number of people who have been treated for COVID and survived and will end up with huge medical bills.

“There’s a huge number of people that have died from COVID and their families will end up with huge medical bills.

“And they cannot pay these bills —even people who have insurance, because often insurance has huge deductibles.” Asked what could replace the US system, Deaton rolled off a list that includes the French, Canadian, German, Dutch and Swiss models.

“Anything is better than pretending that the market can deliver healthcare — because it can’t,” he said.

“All you get is this enormous con-spiracy to sort of transfer money from ordinary people to much better-off people.

“It’s been a major destroyer of jobs and a major source of inequality.” He added: “The stumbling block for better

welfare state in America has often been race, and maybe what’s happening now will change that.” However, Deaton is not optimistic: “The most likely thing it that it will end up the same as it was.”

The global outbreak has paralysed many economies, although reopenings and government aid in the United States are credited with lowering the unem-ployment rate to a still-high 13.3 percent.

“I’m worried that unemployment will last for a very long time, that this will strengthen the share of capital relative to GDP,” Deaton said.

“I’m really worried that big tech firms are going to prosper while many other businesses go bankrupt.” And he warned: “If you have more monopolistic firms, that’s a recipe for GDP to be distributed towards capitalists.”

Deaton warned that reform was needed to break up the big tech com-panies — along with reform in other areas, such as improving policing in inner cities.

“Unless the system breaks and you get major reform I think all of this, I think all the indicators turn towards making inequalities worse,” he said.

A file photo of US-British microeconomist and 2015 Nobel Prize winner in Economics, Angus Deaton.

Oscars, BAFTAs postponed by two monthsAFP — LOS ANGELES

Next year’s Oscars have been postponed by eight weeks to April 25 after the coronavirus pandemic shuttered movie theaters and wreaked havoc on Hollywood’s release calendar, the Academy said on Monday.

With many studio block-busters and indie arthouse movies forced to push back their release dates until theaters reopen, the cut-off date for Oscar-eligible films has also been extended by two months, to the end of February.

“Our hope, in extending the eligibility period and our Awards date, is to provide the flexibility filmmakers need to finish and release their films without being penalized for something beyond anyone’s control,” said Academy pres-ident David Rubin and CEO Dawn Hudson in a statement.

The movie industry’s biggest night was originally scheduled for February 28, 2021. Monday’s move was prompted by con-cerns that a field consisting only of films released in 2020 would not be as broad or competitive as in previous years.

Most US movie theaters remain closed, and film produc-tions have ground to a halt, with fears mounting of a second wave of COVID-19 cases.

Productions s lowly restarting in the coming weeks as lockdown restrictions ease will now have two extra months to finish without having to sac-rifice their Oscar hopes.

The delay also boosts hopes that the 93rd Academy Awards

can remain a live, star-studded ceremony, rather than shifting to a “virtual” presentation.

“We find ourselves in uncharted territory this year and will continue to work with our partners at the Academy to ensure next year’s show is a safe and celebratory event,” said Karey Burke, president of ABC Entertainment, which will broadcast the show in the United States.

The Oscars have been post-poned before — after Los Angeles flooded in 1938, Martin Luther King Jr’s assassination in 1968 and the shooting of President Ronald Reagan in 1981 — but never by more than a week.

The Academy —seen as the apex body of the Hollywood film industry — had already eased some eligibility rules in April, allowing movies that skip

the big screen and appear on streaming platforms to contend for Oscars this year.

The Oscars are the grand finale of a movie award season starting in earnest with the Golden Globes in early January.

Immediately following the Academy’s announcement, Britain’s BAFTAs — which typ-ically take place shortly before the Oscars — were postponed to April 11.

The change “acknowledges the impact of the global pan-demic and accommodates an extended eligibility period,” BAFTA said in a statement.

Other film award shows are widely expected to announce similar delays. Academy events including the Governors Awards — where honorary Oscars are presented to industry veterans — and a ceremony for scientific and technical were also

postponed. The much-delayed Academy Museum of Motion Pictures, previously scheduled to open in Los Angeles this December, will now open next April.

“For over a century, movies have played an important role in comforting, inspiring, and entertaining us during the darkest of times. They certainly have this year,” said the Academy statement.

It added: “This coming Oscars and the opening of our new museum will mark an his-toric moment, gathering movie fans around the world to unite through cinema.”

Meanwhile, television’s Primetime Emmys ceremony is still scheduled to take place in September, with discussions over format ongoing.

The Television Academy said on Monday its Creative Arts Emmys — dozens of technical awards, usually handed out the weekend before the main Emmys — will be replaced with a “virtual event.”

A general view of the 92nd annual Oscars preparation on the red carpet at Hollywood & Highland, in Hollywood, California, on February 6, 2020. The 93rd Oscars have been postponed by eight weeks to April 25 because of the coronavirus pandemic.

Over the decades, investigators have considered various theories, including that the group was part of an attempt by the far left or far right to undermine the state.

The Oscars have been postponed before — after Los Angeles flooded in 1938, Martin Luther King Jr’s assassination in 1968 and the shooting of President Ronald Reagan in 1981 — but never by more than a week.

Study: Under-20s

half as likely to

contract virus

AFP — PARIS

People under the age of 20 are half as likely to contract COVID-19 than the rest of the population, according to new modelling released yesterday that suggests four out of five infected young people show no symptoms.

The research, published in the Nature Medicine Journal, could help inform the next moves of governments under pressure to reopen schools and colleges shuttered since the start of the pandemic.

Experts from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine developed age-based COVID-19 trans-mission models based on data from six countries — China, Italy, Japan, Singapore, Canada and South Korea.

They also factored in pre-vious research on estimated infection rates and severity of symptoms.

The team estimated that under-20s are at half the risk of COVID-19 infection than over-20s.

They also found a wide variation in symptomatic cases linked to age: only 21 percent of those aged 10 to 19 were likely to show symptoms com-pared with 69 percent of over-70s.

The researchers then sim-ulated COVID-19 outbreaks in 146 capital cities around the world to see what effect school closures had on the spread of the disease.

Unlike with influenza out-breaks, where transmission was modelled to be sharply curtailed if schools were closed, the authors found the measure had little effect on stopping the novel coronavirus spreading.

“Whether to reopen schools or not is a complicated question,” said study co-author Rosalind Eggo.

“We’ve provided some evi-dence showing an indication of decreased (COVID-19) sus-ceptibility in children.” Numerous studies have shown that COVID-19 symptoms are likely to be more severe the older the patient is.

There have been relatively few confirmed cases in children, though whether or not this is down to fewer young people catching the virus or proportionally fewer showing symptoms when they do is not clear. A variety of explanations has been offered, including that children are more frequently exposed to coronaviruses and therefore better equipped to fight off COVID-19 infection.

US approves first ‘digital therapeutic’ game for ADHD

AFP — WASHINGTON

US health officials have approved the first game-based treatment for children with attention deficit hyper-activity disorder, part of a trend toward “digital thera-peutics” or software to address certain conditions.

The Food and Drug Administration said on Monday it approved the sale by prescription of the game EndeavorRX from health tech startup Akili Interactive for children aged 8-12 who have been diagnosed with ADHD.

The FDA said this was the first digital therapeutic intended to treat ADHD, as well as the first game-based therapeutic approved for any type of condition.

The game, designed to improve cognitive function, is designed as part of a program that may also include other kinds of therapy, medication, and edu-cational programs.

“The EndeavorRx device offers a non-drug option for improving symptoms asso-ciated with ADHD in children and is an important example of the growing field of digital therapy and digital thera-peutics,” said Jeffrey Shuren, director of the FDA Center for Devices and Radiological Health.

FAJR SUNRISE 03.14 am 04.43 am

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places and relatively hot by night.

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ASR ISHA

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