Volume 22 | Number 7279 | 2 RiyalsSaturday 9 September 2017 | 18 Dhul-Hijja 1438 www.thepeninsulaqatar.com

3rd Best News Website in the Middle East

Doha

QNA

The State of Qatar expressed yesterday its rejection and con-demnation of the statement issued by

the siege countries led by Saudi Arabia, which included unsub-stantiated allegations and accusations against Qatar.

Director of the Information Office at the Foreign Ministry H E Ambassador Ahmed bin Saeed Al Rumaihi told the Qatar News Agency (QNA) yesterday that the statement from the quartet which alleged that Qatar interferes in internal affairs of other countries and finances terrorism is baseless. He added that those allegations also contradicted Qatar’s poli-cies which are based on respecting the sovereignty of other countries, in addition to its contradiction with the inter-national recognition the State of Qatar received for its efforts in counter-terrorism.

The statement from the siege countries also said that remarks made by Foreign Min-ister H E Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani, follow-ing statements made by the

Emir of Kuwait in Washington, reflected the State of Qatar’s rejection of dialogue for resolv-ing the crisis. The Ambassador commented on that and said that the statement inaccurately interpreted the remarks of the Foreign Minister, which renewed the State of Qatar’s commitment to dialogue which it made clear since the begin-ning of the crisis.

He reflected on reports that Qatar accepts the 13 demands of the siege countries and said that the comment made by the Emir of Kuwait was taken out of context. He said that the full context showed clearly the rejection of demands that infringe on sovereignty.

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Qatar rejectssiege nations’allegations

Sidi Mohamed The Peninsula

As schools are set to resume their classes from tomor-row, the Traffic

Department has chalked out plans to maintain the smooth flow of vehicles on roads. They will increase patrols particularly during opening and closing hours of schools with focus on round-abouts, intersections and near schools.

“The traffic patrols will double their efforts to make traffic flow smooth especially on the first day of schools’

opening,” said Major Jaber Mohamed Rashid Odaiba, Assistant Director of Media & Traffic awareness section of the General Directorate of Traffic.

“The police patrols will focus more on areas like Al Mamoura which has more than 15 schools. We don’t like to be near the schools but will be monitoring all the roads leading to them,” he added. Traffic department has also focused on creating aware-ness and posted a number of tips on the department’s twitter and Facebook pages to motorists and road users.

→Continued on Page 2

Qatar will stick to its policiesNew York

QNA

The State of Qatar has affirmed that nothing will stop it from its approach

and policy, which enjoy the sup-port of the international community. and that it will con-tinue to fulfill its legal and moral obligations to help needy peo-ple, work with its partners in the international community to meet common challenges and continue its efforts to resolve dis-putes by Peaceful means, despite the unilateral measures it faces in imposing an illegal land, sea and air siege.

Full story on page 2

Emir greets President of MacedoniaEMIR H H Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani sent yester-day a cable of congratulations to President of the Republic of Macedonia, Gjorge Ivanov, on the occasion of the anniversary of his country’s Independence Day. Deputy Emir H H Sheikh Abdullah bin Hamad Al Thani also sent a cable of congratu-lations to Gjorge Ivanov while Prime Minister and Interior Minister H E Sheikh Abdul-lah bin Nasser bin Khalifa Al Thani greeted Prime Minister of Macedonia, Zoran Zaev, on the occasion.

Qatar donates $30m to help Harvey victims Doha

Al Jazeera

Qatar is donating $30m to help people in Texas recover from Hurricane

Harvey, its ambassador said. This is apparently the largest contribution from a foreign government to assist the dev-astated stretches of the Texas coast. Doha pledged the funds through the newly created Qatar Harvey Fund, which Ambassador Meshal bin Hamad Al Thani said would work with Texas Governor Greg Abbott, local organisa-tions and other Texas officials. The funds will be used “to help rebuild communities” affected by flooding.

Traffic Police gear up to meet school rush

Two new shipping lines from Hamad Port Irfan Bukhari The Peninsula

Two new maritime lines are being launched from Hamad Port on Septem-

ber 17 which will enhance Qatar’s trade connections with various ports in China, India, Malaysia, Turkey and Greece, among other countries.

Qatar Ports Management Company (Mwani Qatar) announced yesterday that two shipping companies, Mediter-ranean Shipping Company (MSC) and Yang Ming, would open the new lines from Sep-tember 17, 2017.

MSC will launch a new line in Mediterranean Sea with four ships, each with a capacity of 6,000 containers including 400

reefer containers. This new service will be weekly and run through ports of Mersin, Istan-bul, Tekridag, Canakkale and Iskenderun in Turkey, Piraeus in Greece, Mundara in India, Sohar and Salalah in Oman and Hamad Port in Qatar.

Mwani Qatar has also announced on its social media pages that another shipping company Yang Ming will start a weekly service with one ship of 6,000 containers including 400 reefer containers capacity.

It will connect Shanghai, Ningbo, Xiamen and Shekou in China, Kaohsiung in Taiwan, Port Klang in Malaysia and Hamad Port in Qatar.

MSC is the world’s second-largest shipping line in terms of container vessel capacity. As of

the end of December 2014, MSC was operating 471 container vessels with an intake capacity of 2,435,000 twenty-foot equiv-alent units (TEU). The Geneva-headquartered com-pany operates in all major ports of the world.

MSC had inaugurated its maiden voyage between Hamad Port and Salalah Port in June this year and MSC KERRY was the first vessel that called the Hamad Port.

Yang Ming Marine Transport Corporation is an ocean ship-ping company based in Keelung, Taiwan (ROC). Yang Ming cur-rently operates 84 container ships up to 8,250 twenty-foot equivalent units (TEU) and 17 bulk carriers.

→Continued on page 2

The Ambassador stressed that the position of the State of Qatar was clear since the beginning of the crisis, which was reaffirmed in the remarks of the Foreign Minister.

Siege has no impact on back-to-school stationery suppliesSanaullah AtaullahThe Peninsula

Amid the surge in demand for school supplies ahead of the schools reo-

pening, local companies have

succeeded in maintaining ade-quate stocks at competitive prices by overcoming hurdles created by the blockade.

Some stationery companies have signed contracts with local suppliers for school items

as an alternative in case of any delay in the arrival of consign-m e n t s d i r e c t l y f r o m manufacturing companies, sta-tionery shops told The Peninsula.

“We have enough stocks of

school items like notebooks, pens, pencils, bags, lunch boxes, water bottles, among other accessories, at reasona-ble prices,” an official from a company with a chain of sta-tionery shops across Qatar said.

The official said that his company had recently received a container of stationery from China and was waiting for more consignments in the coming days.

→Continued on page 2

MSC will launch a new weekly service with 4 ships,

each with a capacity of 6,000 containers including

400 reefer containers.

Yang Ming will start a weekly service with one ship with 6,000 containers including 400 reefer containers capacity.

Families shopping for back-to-school items at a hypermarket in Doha. Pic: Salim Matramkot / The Peninsula

SPORT | 17BUSINESS | 11 QATAR

97UNDER SIEGE

DAY

THEngland’s Anderson joins 500 wicket club

LNG glut may flip to deficit as Cheniere sees

China growth

Emir and Saudi Crown Prince hold phone talks → Story on page 2

Tillerson meetsKuwaiti FMUS Secretary of State Rex Tillerson met yesterday with Kuwaiti First Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Min-ister Sheikh Sabah Khalid Al-Hamad Al-Sabah. They discussed means of enhanc-ing joint cooperation.

02 SATURDAY 9 SEPTEMBER 2017HOME

Athens

QNA

Qatar’s Ambassador to Greece H E Abdulaziz Ali Al Naama stressed that the

State of Qatar is able to endure the situation caused by the siege for a long time.

In an interview with the Greek newspaper ‘The Editors’ the ambassador said “We are preparing to present 3,000 law-suits from individuals and 600 files in Qatar Chamber of Com-merce to international courts.

He pointed out that the State of Qatar has filed a complaint to the World Trade Organization (WTO) against the trade embargo imposed by the siege countries to avoid the repercussions and economic damage caused by the siege.

He explained that Qatar filed this complaint after losing hope that the siege countries would

reconsider their positions, which is contrary to social norms and international laws.

The Ambassador said that the siege countries “have only two options; either to negotiate with the Qatari government within 60 days, or to face trade sanctions and international banks’ refrain from dealing with them if the World Trade Organ-ization rules in favour of Qatar”.

He pointed out that the siege countries have also begun to suf-fer, as some international banks started offering their services to

Qatar through their London and New York centers instead of Dubai because of the difficulties imposed by the Gulf crisis.

On the implications of the Convention on Combating Ter-rorism signed recently by Qatar and the US , the Ambassador said that the significance of this agreement stems from the facts that the major powers recognise the State of Qatar as a party to the international coalition against extremism and terror-ism, Qatar’s continued fulfilment of its international obligations

to promote international peace and security, its efforts to settle disputes through peaceful means and its international and bilat-eral counter-terrorism efforts.

He noted that “the State of Qatar has provided educational opportunities for more than 7 million children and created more than 300,000 jobs to give hope to those at risk of being recruited by terrorist groups”.

On the implications of the return of the Qatari ambassador to Tehran, Al Naama said that the return reflects Qatar’s desire to develop its relations with Iran, adding that his is reflected in the Qatari Foreign Ministry’s state-ment, which announced the resumption of diplomatic rela-tions between Doha and Tehran, where the State of Qatar expressed its aspiration to strengthen bilateral relations with the Islamic Republic of Iran in all fields.

Secretary-General of the Foreign Ministry H E Dr Ahmed bin Hassan Al

Hammadi met yesterday in Warsaw with Deputy Mar-shall of Poland’s lower house of parliament (Sejm) Ryszard Terlecki, who is also Parlia-mentary Caucus Head of the ruling Law and Justice party.

They discussed bilateral relations and the means to enhance them.

Secretary-General of Foreign Ministry meets Polish official

We can endure siege for a long time: EnvoyThe Ambassador said that the siege countries “have only two options; either to negotiate with the Qatari government within 60 days, or to face trade sanctions and international banks’ refrain from dealing with them if the World Trade Organization rules in favour of Qatar”.

New York

QNA

The State of Qatar has affirmed that nothing will stop it from its approach

and policy, which enjoy the sup-port of the international community, and that it will con-tinue to fulfil its legal and moral obligations to help needy peo-ple, work with its partners in the international community to meet common challenges and con-tinue its efforts to resolve disputes by Peaceful means, despite the unilateral measures it faces in imposing an illegal land, sea and air siege.

This came in the State of Qatar’s statement delivered by the Permanent Representative of the State of Qatar to the United Nations H E Sheikha Alia Ahmed bin Saif Al Thani before the High-level forum on the culture of peace at United Nations Head-quarters yesterday.

Ambassador H E Sheikha Alia Ahmed bin Saif Al Thani said that as part of the international com-munity’s commitment to the

Declaration and Program of Action on the Culture of Peace, we must acknowledge the efforts and the achievements made in the promotion of a culture of peace and non-violence. We must also recognise that the path towards achieving and spread-ing the culture of peace in the world is not free of obstacles and challenges that can not be over-come without cooperation and cooperation between Member States, intergovernmental organ-izations, civil society, the academic sector and the busi-ness sector, she added.

In this regard, she praised the inclusion of dissemination of the culture of peace in the Sustain-able Development Goals of 2030,

particularly the 16th goal, point-ing that the State of Qatar attaches great importance to it.

She added that as part of the State of Qatar’s relentless efforts to promote peace and under-standing among peoples and to promote values of tolerance and cooperation between cultures and faiths, the country has estab-lished several national institutions that promote the cul-ture of peace, acceptance of the other, the fight against violent extremism and renouncing vio-lence, and play an active role in spreading the of peace at the national, regional and interna-tional levels.

She pointed out that the Doha International Center for

Interfaith Dialogue actively con-tributes to efforts of combating extremism and hatred and to building bridges of cooperation and understanding between fol-lowers of different religions. The Hamad bin Khalifa Islamic Center, established by the state in Copenhagen, Denmark, also contributes to international efforts to promote peaceful co-existence among religions, she said adding that the State of Qatar is among the leading coun-tries that support the United Nations Alliance of Civilizations, which plays an active role in pro-moting the culture of peace.

In the context of interna-tional efforts to combat violent extremism and terrorism, Sheikh Alia said that the State of Qatar adopts a cooperative approach and addresses the root causes of violent extremism, particularly among youth by focusing on education, being one of the most important means to build strong-holds of peace in the minds of future generations. She added that Qatar has established many institutions and launched many

initiatives in the field of educa-tion at the national, regional and international levels, especially in areas plagued by conflicts and war, such as the World Summit for Innovation in Education WISE, the Syrian Education and Training Initiative (QUEST), the Education for All, and the Edu-cate a Child program. The State of Qatar is also working on capacity building and empow-erment of local communities, providing employment and training, strengthening the econ-omy and encouraging dialogue in addition to embracing toler-ance, fighting extremism and renouncing sectarian and ethnic discrimination.

Ambassador Alia Ahmed bin Saif Al Thani said that as part of the State of Qatar’s contribution to the international efforts to prevent conflicts and mediation, the State has adopted a clear pol-icy aimed at preventing and resolving armed conflicts by peaceful means. She explained that the State of Qatar has made great efforts to resolve disputes through mediation at the request

of the parties concerned, based on the Charter of the United Nations and the principle of dia-logue as an alternative approach to resolving disputes between the parties. These efforts have yielded satisfactory results for all parties and have been welcomed by international community.

It was pointed out that tak-ing unilateral measures instead of resorting to dialogue for resolving differences between States, did not serve the efforts to promote the culture of peace which is based on mutual respect and dialogue to settle differences and adversely affected UN efforts to promote peace in the world.

Ambassador Sheikha Alia Ahmed bin Saif Al Thani, Qatar’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations, reiterated Qatar’s commitment to imple-ment the Declaration and Program of Action on a Culture of Peace and to continue to sup-port all efforts at the national, regional and international lev-els to promote a culture of peace and non-violence. For the ben-efit of all humankind.

Qatar to continue efforts to resolve disputes peacefully H E Sheikha Alia Ahmed bin Saif Al Thani said that as part of the State of Qatar’s contribution to the international efforts to prevent conflicts and mediation, the State has adopted a clear policy aimed at preventing and resolving armed conflicts by peaceful means.

Continued from Page 1The Ambassador stressed

that the position of the State of Qatar was clear since the beginning of the crisis, which was reaffirmed in the remarks of the Foreign Min-ister yesterday. Qatar was willing to discuss any request by the siege countries in the context of a constructive dia-logue based on respecting international law and the sov-ereignty of countries.

The Ambassador Ahmed bin Saeed Al Rumaihi expressed appreciation of the Emir, the government, and the people of Qatar for the mediation efforts of the Emir of Kuwait in order to resolve the crisis. He also expressed Qatar’s appreciation to all countries that supported Kuwaiti mediation.

Continued from Page 1

“To avoid traffic jam, people should leave their homes early and use public transport instead of personal vehicles to avoid congestion,” Al Odaiba said.

From next week, the Traffic Depart-ment will also organise awareness campaigns for Karwa drivers, he added. “We will organise lectures in languages

like English, Arabic and Urdu. Karwa has agreed with us that all drivers will attend the lectures”, Al Odaiba said.

He said that the department would also organise various activities at schools and will distribute gifts to students and the main opening activity will be held at Omar bin Al Khattab Independent Sec-ond Primary school for boys. “Also there will be activities for community schools.”

Continued from Page 1

“Stationery shops are full with stocks of different quality,” Abdul Qadeer, a father of five school going children told The Peninsula. “I bought stationery items for my children yesterday. The school supplies including bag, lunchbox, water bottle, notebooks, pen and pencils among other cost me about QR250 per child,” said Abdul Qadeer.

“Prices of school bags range between QR50 to QR250 at various outlets in the local market but I preferred the one which was available at QR100 due to its quality and also considering my budget,” he added.

School uniforms are also available at various outlets and tailoring shops. Shopping complexes are not lagging behind in the race. Some major outlets offer school uniforms on reasonable prices, The Peninsula has noticed.

“I bought two sets of school uniform and a sport-kit for my daughter at QR330 from a shop at Bin Mamoud, Abdullah,” a father of two school going children told The Peninsula.

To avoid any shortage because of the

rerouting of the shipments due to block-ade, the company has signed contracts with five local suppliers to meet the growing demand ahead of school open-ing, said the official.

“Local suppliers are playing a key role in maintaining the stocks. A truck carrying bags and notebooks from a local supplier is unloading now at the store of the facility,” he added.

Regarding the price hike of station-ery ahead of school opening, the official said: “We did not increase the prices of any stationery items this year”.

For example, the most selling items are notebooks and school bags. “We offer a dozen famous notebooks called locally as ‘bunni’ (brown color) at QR17 and the price of a notebook is QR1.25, QR1.5 and QR1.7 as per the size and thickness.”

“School bags are also available at very competitive prices at all branches of my company across the country. We offer small bags at QR22 and a big one at QR40 per piece,” he added.

Speaking to The Peninsula, the par-ents expressed satisfaction over the availability of stocks of stationery items in local markets.

Continued from Page 1

Yang Ming’s service scope covers over 70 nations with more than 170 service points. Mwani Qatar in cooperation with its partners has launched a number of new direct shipping lines between Hamad Port and various ports of the region and beyond in the last three months.

The new routes, launched after impo-sition of blockade by three Gulf countries, have connected Hamad Port to Sohar and Salalah ports in Oman, Shuwaikh Port in Kuwait, Karachi Port in Pakistan, Izmir Port in Turkey, Mundra and Nava Shiva Ports in India. Within a week of three Gulf countries imposing a blockade on Qatar, Mwani Qatar launched a new direct service between Hamad Port and Sohar Port in Oman under Milaha’s DMJ

service — three times a week. On June 23, another new line linking Hamad Port directly to Salalah Port was launched.

Mwani Qatar had announced launch-ing a new maritime line between Qatar and India named “India Qatar Express Service” (IQX) on June 14. Last month, Kuwait Qatar Express Service started between Hamad Port and Shuwaikh Port in Kuwait using a 515 TEU vessel.

On August 27, Milaha announced the launch of a direct service between Paki-stan and Qatar. The new service, called PQX (Pakistan Qatar Express Service), is operating weekly between the Port of Karachi, Pakistan and Hamad Port, Qatar with a competitive transit time of 4 days, making it the fastest direct connection between the two countries.

Two new shipping lines from Hamad Port

No impact of siege on school stationery supplies

More traffic patrols to meet school rush

Qatar rejects siege nations’ allegations

QNA

Emir H H Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani held a telephone conversation

yesterday evening with Presi-dent Donald Trump of the friendly United States of America.

During the phone call , they discussed the latest develop-ments related to the Gulf crisis in light of Kuwait’s efforts to resolve it through diplomatic channels and through dialogue between all parties to ensure the security and stability of the region.

The US President briefed H H Emir on the results of his communication with HRH Prince Mohammed bin Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud, Crown Prince of the Kingdom of Saudi

Arabia, as well as the discus-sions held in this regard with the Emir of Kuwait H H Sheikh Sabah Al Ahmad Al Jaber Al Sabah, within the framework of the generous mediation led by His Highness.

Following that, a telephone conversation was held between HH the Emir and his brother, HRH Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia, based on coordination of the US President, where they stressed the need to resolve this crisis by sitting down to the dia-logue to ensure the unity and stability of the GCC countries.

HH the Emir welcomed the proposal of his brother HRH the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia during the call to assign two envoys to resolve controversial issues in a way that does not affect the sovereignty of States.

Emir holds telephone talks with US President

Leisure time...

Tourists enjoying camel ride at Sealine Beach, yesterday. Pic: Baher Amin / The Peninsula

03SATURDAY 9 SEPTEMBER 2017 MIDDLE EAST / AFRICA

Istanbul

Reuters

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan urged the United States yester-day to review

charges against a Turkish former minister for violating US-Iran sanctions, saying Ankara had never agreed to comply with the embargo and the prosecution was politically motivated.

“There are very peculiar smells coming from this issue,” Erdogan said.

Former economy minister Zafer Caglayan and the

ex-head of a state-owned Turkish bank were charged with conspiring to violate the sanctions by illegally moving hundreds of millions of dollars through the US financial sys-tem on Tehran’s behalf.

“For the moment, it is impossible to evaluate this within legal logic,” Erdogan told reporters at Istanbul’s Ataturk airport. “I see this step against our former economy minister as a step against the Turkish Republic.

“We didn’t decide to impose sanctions on Iran. We have bilateral ties with Iran, sensitive relations,” he said, adding he had told former US

President Barack Obama as much, when the sanctions were in force. “We said to the relevant people, we said we would not take part in sanc-tions... These steps are purely political.”

Prosecutors in New York said on Wednesday they had charged Caglayan and former Halkbank general manager Suleyman Aslan and two oth-ers with “conspiring to use the US financial system to conduct hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of transactions on behalf of the government of Iran and other Iranian entities, which were barred by United States sanctions.”

The charges stem from the case against Reza Zarrab, a wealthy Turkish-Iranian gold trader who was arrested in the United States over sanctions evasion last year. He has pleaded not guilty.

Reporters were not able to reach Caglayan or Aslan for comment.

“The United States needs to revise this decision (to charge Caglayan),” Erdogan said. “I hope we’ll get a chance to discuss this issue in the United States. You may be a big nation, but being a just nation is something else. Being a just nation requires the legal sys-tem to work fairly.”

US needs to review charges: Erdogan

Moscow

AFP

Russia claimed yesterday to have killed several top commanders of the

Islamic State group in an air strike in Syria, including the US-trained “minister of war” who has a $3m bounty on his head.

“As a result of a precision air strike of the Russian air forces in the vicinity of Deir Ezzor city, a command post, some 40 ISIS fighters have been killed,” the Russian defence ministry said in a statement posted on Facebook.

“According to confirmed data, among the killed fighters are four influential field com-manders including Deir Ezzor emir Abu Mohammed Al Shi-mali,” the ministry said.

Gulmurod Khalimov, who is known as the IS group’s minis-ter of war and the highest-ranking defector from ex-Soviet Tajikistan, suffered a “fatal injury,” it added.

Reports of Khalimov’s death have surfaced before, and the Tajik interior ministry said it could not immediately confirm the claim. “We are working with our Russian colleagues to obtain reliable information,” a spokes-man said. But a spokesman for the Tajik security services, speaking to AFP, suggested that “this time around” he might have been killed.

“We’re checking the infor-mation,” he said. In 2016, the United States offered a $3m

bounty for information leading to Khalimov’s location or arrest.

Russia’s SU warplanes dropped “bunker buster” bombs on the fighters as they were meeting near Deir Ezzor to dis-cuss how to respond to the advance of the Syrian army, Moscow said. Backed by Russia, Syrian troops on Tuesday broke through a years-long siege imposed by IS militants on tens of thousands of civilians in Deir Ezzor.

The Times reported in April that Khalimov, described as the highest-ranking IS commander in Mosul, had been killed in an airstrike. The trained sniper and former colonel, he was appar-ently wounded in 2015 but survived.

He headed the Tajik interior ministry’s special forces unit and received American training before joining IS in 2015, pledg-ing allegiance to the jihadist group in a video released in May 2015. In the footage he warned that he and other IS recruits based in the Middle East were

“coming” for top officials in the mainly Muslim Tajikistan, including long-ruling President Emomali Rakhmon.

The high-profile defection rocked the country. Last year, his second wife, herself a former interior ministry official, fled Tajikistan with her three young children to join Khalimov in Syria. The Syrian government has denied a UN report accusing

it of a sarin attack in April that killed scores of people, state media said yesterday.

Damascus sent the United Nations a letter “asserting that Syria has not and will not use toxic gases against its people because it does not have them in the first place”, state news agency SANA said.

UN war crimes investigators said this week that Syrian forces

have used chemical weapons more than two dozen times dur-ing the six-year conflict.The UN Commission of Inquiry on Syria said a government warplane dropped sarin on Khan Sheikhoun in insurgent-held Idlib province in April, killing more than 80 civilians. The attack prompted a US missile strike on a Syrian government air base.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan speaks during a news conference at Ataturk International Airport in Istanbul, yesterday.

Top IS commanders dead in Syria: Russia

Harare

AFP

President Robert Mugabe yesterday accused a recently launched oppo-

sition alliance seeking to unseat him in next year’s elec-tions of plotting with Western powers to force him out.

Morgan Tsvangirai, the leader of the country’s main opposition party the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), formed a grand coalition last month with former allies and four opposition parties in an effort to end Mugabe’s 37-year rule.

“Recently we have wit-nessed the concerted effort by opposition political parties to coalesce and fight (us) as one,” Mugabe, 93, said at a meeting of his ZANU-PF party’s central committee in Harare.

“We know of course they are a creature of the West whose sole purpose is to dis-lodge ZANU-PF from power, but really if they come together as a bundle, one blow will set the bundle in pieces.

“Fortunately for ZANU-PF, the political parties are as divided as ever, fighting over political positions.”

A planned pact between Tsvangirai and Mugabe’s former vice president Joice Mujuru failed following disa-greements over leadership.

Tsvangirai has made three failed bids for the presidency. In 2008, he beat Mugabe in the first round of voting but failed to win an outright majority, leading to a run-off. He later pulled out of the second ballot

as violence against his sup-porters raged.

Past elections in Zimbabwe have been marred by violence, intimidation and charges of electoral fraud.

The president, who often travels abroad for medical treatment, has refused to name a successor and repeatedly denounced factionalism within his own party.

Istanbul

Anatolia

Turkey’s Federation of Food and Drink Indus-try Association said

yesterday that the tainted egg crisis is a political debate.

“We must act very care-fully. There is no trace of [poisonous] residue in eggs produced in Turkey. The tainted egg crisis stems from political issues,” said Semsi Kopuz, head of the associa-tion. In a statement, Kopuz said that some countries were using the issue to worsen relations between Germany and Turkey.

He added that the EU Commission had accused Turkey of exporting tainted eggs. The commission had earlier reported that 24 out of 28 EU countries had eggs with traces of fipronil, a chemical found in pesticides used to control fleas in animals. According to the World Health Organization, fipronil is “moderately toxic” if eaten in large quantities and may have dangerous effects on the kidneys.

Rome

Reuters

The United Nations is pre-paring to deploy 150-250 mostly Nepalese guards

to Libya to protect its base in the capital as part of a plan to return its operations to the country, UN officials said yesterday.

Backed by Western govern-ments, the UN is trying to heal a rift between Libya’s rival fac-tions in order to stabilise the country and to tackle militant violence and people-smuggling from Libya’s northern coast.

The mission has been based in Tunis since 2014, when fight-ing among rival Libyan brigades forced out most for-eign embassy staff, but it has gradually increased its pres-ence in Libya and has been planning for months for a fuller return.

The military unit would probably consist of around 150 guards, Jean-Pierre Lacroix, UN Under-Secretary-General for Peacekeeping Operations, said.

“To make sure that we pro-tect our colleagues as they deploy in Tripoli there will be

a guard unit which will be basi-cally UN military personnel coming from Nepal,” Lacroix said. UN Libya envoy Ghassan Salame said that “a little under 250” could be deployed in the “coming weeks”. Deploying the guards to the base in Tripoli “will mean that around the beginning of October we can carry out a significant part of our work in Libya,” said Salame, who has headed the mission since June.

A spokesperson for the mission said there were no plans to send UN peacekeep-ers to Libya.

Security in Tripoli and other parts of western Libya is fragile, and armed groups that are largely unaccountable hold power on the ground.

Most foreign embassies closed and pulled out their staff in 2014 when heavy fighting between rival factions destroyed the capital’s airport. It was the worst fighting since the fall of long-time leader Muammar Gaddafi in 2011.

In July, rival leaders pledged in Paris to work towards elections in 2018 and a conditional ceasefire.

Jerusalem

AFP

The wife of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has been

formally told that she faces a possible trial over alleged misuse of public funds, the justice ministry said yesterday.

“The attorney general has informed the counsel of Mrs. Sara Netanyahu, wife of the prime minister, that he is con-sidering putting her on trial, over her part in the ‘catering affair’,” it said in a statement.

It refers to allegations that she and an aide falsely declared that there were no cooks available at the prime minister’s official government residence in Jerusalem and they ordered from outside caterers at public expense.

“In this way, hundreds of meals from restaurants and chefs were fraudulently obtained from chefs and res-taurants at a cost of 359,000 shekels ($102,000, 85,000 euros),” the statement said.

It added that Sara Netan-yahu would be able to argue her case in front of Israeli Attorney General Avichai Mandelblit at a hearing before he makes a final decision on whether to press charges. Netanyahu denied any wrongdoing.

Tainted eggs ‘mired in politics’: Turkey

Netanyahu’s wife faces possible corruption trial

UN to deploy guards to protect its base in Libya

Zimbabwe oppn accused of plot

Syrian government forces gesture and inspect the site as they arrive at a destroyed bridge on a road between the Kabajeb and Al Shula on the southwestern outskirts of Deir Ezzor, yesterday.

40 fighters dead

“As a result of a precision air strike of the Russian air forces in the vicinity of Deir Ezzor city, a command post, some 40 ISIS fighters have been killed,” the Russian defence ministry said.

President Robert Mugabe (left) and his wife Grace attend a rally of his ruling ZANU (PF) in Chinhoyi, Zimbabwe, yesterday.

04 SATURDAY 9 SEPTEMBER 2017ASIA

Bus disaster

Rahul slams Modi for ignoring farmersNanded

IANS

The country needs farm-ers as much as it needs industrialists but under the government led by Prime Minister

Narendra Modi, farmers’ suicides have increased in the country, Congress Vice President Rahul Gandhi said in Maharashtra yesterday.

“In the past three years, 9,000 farmers ended their lives in Maharashtra... India’s farm-ers have been under attack all over the country. Modi gave Rs 65,000 crore to one person for setting up the Nano factory but did not give a rupee to the farm-ers,” Gandhi said in a renewed attack on the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

He said the farmers’ loan waivers in Uttar Pradesh and Maharashtra were the outcome of the “pressure from the Con-gress”, but the waivers are yet to

be implemented fully.Citing the case of Maharash-

tra, he alleged that a loan waiver of Rs 35,000 crore is said to have been implemented, but actually only Rs 5,000 crore have been disbursed by the state govern-ment, while the Congress regime had given farm loan waivers of Rs 70,000 crore.

“What is the need for asking the caste of the farmers for loan

waiver... why should they be made to stand in long queues?” Gandhi asked, addressing large meetings of party workers on his daylong visit to Nanded and Parbhani.

Accusing the government of working for “the interests of 50 top industrialists,” he held the Prime Minister responsible for what he termed “the failure of demonetisation”.

Gandhi said Modi had put the common people to hardship by cancelling the currency notes of Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 value in November last year, ruined the economy and the GDP tumbled down to 4.5 percent. “Who is answerable for this?”

“What was the real reason? Perhaps, he did not like the design of the old currency notes,” Gan-dhi said sarcastically, questioning the wisdom behind the measure in near-identical speeches in Nanded and Parbhani.

“It was claimed terrorism w o u l d r e d u c e a f t e r

demonetisation, but in Jammu and Kashmir, the picture is dif-ferent... 99 percent of the money was returned after demonetisa-tion, then where is the black money that was supposed to come out? The truth is: Modi has converted all the black monies through demonetisation,” he alleged.

The Congress Vice President said the main issues confronting the country are protecting the interests of the farmers and pro-viding jobs to the unemployed.

“Under the ‘Make In India’, Modi had said two crore youths would be given jobs, but in real-ity, there are zero job opportunities created. Every-where we see ‘Made In China’ and our competition is with China. Then what was the pur-pose of ‘Make In India’.”

Accusing Modi of “showing false dreams”, Gandhi said the Prime Minister speaks of giving the Bullet Trains but the govern-ment does nothing about

education, health and unemployment.

“The government does not want the names of Mahatma Gandhi, Indira Gandhi, Rajiv Gandhi... They have started eras-ing them from textbooks, but how will they remove them from the hearts of over a billion Indians.

“The Congress may have shortcomings... But it does not mean we show false dreams to the people. Communal hatred is being spread all over India, in Goa, Manipur and Gujarat... BJP buys votes,” Gandhi claimed.

Focusing on the Goods and Services Tax (GST), he said it was the Congress government’s pol-icy and it did not recommend more than 18 percent GST “for our poor country”.

“But today, we have up to 28 per cent GST and five tax slabs,” he said, criticising the manner in which it has been implemented and said it will hit small and medium businesses very hard.

Farooq seeks results in NIA’s terror fund probeSrinagar

IANS

Former Chief Minister and president of the National Conference (NC) Farooq

Abdullah yesterday said unless the NIA probe into terror fund-ing brings out some result he would not acknowledge the actions taken by the agency.

Abdullah also said he had “no hopes” of anything emerg-ing from Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh’s four-day visit to the state from today.

“Unless the NIA investiga-tion produces some results, I will not acknowledge it. If the NIA action is intended to cre-ate turbulence in Kashmir, then let me tell the Centre and the NIA that no torture would force the people of Kashmir to give up their ideals.”

The NC president was speaking to media on the side-lines of a function to remember his father and NC founder, late Sheikh Muhammad Abdullah on his 35th death anniversary.

Abdullah said “nobody would bow down due to the torture of the NIA and the Gov-ernment of India”.

He alleged that the present NIA probe is being carried out only to “create turbulence” in Kashmir.

Asked what hopes the NC had of Union Home Minister

Rajnath Singh’s four-day visit to the state beginning yester-day, Abdullah said. “I have no hope from this visit.”

He said the separatists “must be released so that they can tell the Home Minister what they have to tell”.

The NC president also said the NIA should probe the “money pumped into the state by the Government of India to weaken” the NC party.

JNU votes to elect union representativesNew Delhi

IANS

THE Jawaharlal Nehru Uni-versity (JNU) yesterday voted to choose its student repre-sentatives for the next one year.

A total of 14 polling booths were set up for about 7,200 students of the varsity to elect a new President, Vice President, General Secretary, and Joint Secretary of the JNU Students Union.

The Left alliance (SFI-AISF-DSF), the All India Students’ Association (AISA), Akhil Bhartiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP), the Con-gress’ National Students Union of India (NSUI) and Birsa-Ambedkar-Phule Stu-dents’ Association (BAPSA) are the prominent student groups in the fray.

Dera headquarters search operation beginsSirsa

IANS

JCB machines, locksmiths, forensic experts and dog squads assisted a comprehen-

sive search operation launched by security agencies and district authorities at the Dera Sacha Sauda headquarters near Hary-ana’s Sirsa town yesterday.

The search operation began amid tight security and curfew in the area yesterday morning.

Officials involved in the search remained tight-lipped about the recoveries made inside. The media was stopped at some distance from the Dera premises to avoid any controversy.

One official said that some cash had been recovered from

inside and that a couple of rooms in one of the buildings had been sealed.

Official sources said that the search operation could take a long time.

Internet services in and around Sirsa town were sus-pended by local authorities yesterday.

The search was being

conducted under the supervision of court commissioner A K S Pawar appointed by the Punjab and Haryana High Courts.

Senior district administra-tion and police officers, along with para-military forces and Haryana Police, were involved in the videographed operation around the sprawling 700-acre campus.

In the past three years, 9,000 farmers ended their lives in Maharashtra...India’s farmers have been under attack all over the country. Modi gave Rs 65,000 crore to one person for setting up the Nano factory but did not give a rupee to farmers: Gandhi

9,000 incidents

Army to induct 800 women in military policeNew Delhi IANS

THE Indian Army would induct women in the Corps of Mili-tary Police and a proposal is being finalised for inducting around 800 women for it -- with an yearly intake of 52, it was announced yesterday.

The decision was announced at the Army Chiefs’ Conclave, a forum of former Army chiefs, who were told that with increas-ing needs for investigation of gender-specific allegations and crime, a necessity was felt to introduce women in the Corps of Military Police.

The Indian Army so far does not have women in any kind of combat roles.

The Indian Army is also starting two more residential Army Public Schools which are likely to come up in Punjab.

Panaji

IANS

Goa Congress President Shantaram Naik yester-day alleged that

right-wing forces could be behind the murder of Bengaluru journalist Gauri Lankesh.

“I strongly feel that right-wing forces are involved, considering that murders of sim-ilar nature took place in Karnataka in the past. She was a strong writer on various issues, about which she felt strongly about. Those affected by her writings must have committed the crime,” Naik said.

Naik, a former Congress Sec-retary in charge of its affairs in Karnataka, also condemned Union Tourism Minister K J Alphons for allegedly asking for-eigners to eat beef in their own countries before visiting India.

He said the Minister should apologise for his controversial statement made yesterday in Odisha.

“These people fail to

understand that you cannot impose eating habits on people. They will eat what they think is proper. Who is this Minister to

decide what people should eat?”Asked by reporters if beef

ban in several states would deter tourists from visiting India,

Alphons reportedly said: “They (foreign tourists) can consume beef in their respective countries and then come here.”

Rajnath ready to discuss Kashmir New Delhi

IANS

AHEAD of his four-day visit to Jammu and Kash-mir, Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh said the gov-ernment was ready to discuss the Kashmir issue with all stakeholders in the state.

“I personally want that we talk to everyone. So whoever comes to meet me, I will talk to them.”

Singh, who begins his visit today, said the govern-ment has “all the intentions” to solve the Kashmir issue.

He will be accompanied by newly-appointed Union Home Secretary Rajiv Gauba and senior ministry officials.

Naik blames right-wing forces for reporter’s death Indian teen rape survivor gives birth to baby boyMumbai

AFP

A 13-year-old rape survi-vor who was allowed to terminate a late preg-

nancy by India’s Supreme Court has given birth to a pre-term baby boy, a doctor said yesterday.

The teenager was 32 weeks pregnant, well beyond India’s 20-week legal limit after which terminations are only allowed where there is a danger to the life of the mother or the baby.

On Wednesday, in a rare ruling the top court had allowed the girl to terminate the preg-nancy in view of the “trauma she has suffered... and the agony she is going through at the present”, according to the copy of the order.

Nikhil Datar, a Mumbai-based doctor who had examined the girl earlier, said the doctors took a call to save

the foetus, a decision they said was in line with the Supreme Court order.

“Terminating pregnancy as sought by the Supreme Court means discontinuing the preg-nancy and not killing the foetus.”

“The Court focused on mother’s health as she is a minor and after the termina-tion we have to accept the consequences as they come.”

“The baby, who is in inten-sive neonatal care, will be put up for adoption,” the hospital said.

The girl, who cannot be named as per Indian law, was raped allegedly by her father’s colleague who has been arrested.

In recent months courts have received a number of peti-tions from women—including young rape survivors and traf-ficking victims—seeking abortions where pregnancies had gone beyond 20 weeks.

An onlooker stands next to a damaged school bus after it collided with a truck in Navapura village, yesterday.

A woman covers her mouth with an orange scarf during a rally called "Not In My Name", in New Delhi.

05SATURDAY 9 SEPTEMBER 2017 ASIA

Malaysia to temporarily shelter RohingyaKuala Lumpur

Reuters

Malaysia’s coast guard will not turn away Rohingya Muslims fleeing violence in Myan-

mar and is willing to provide them temporary shelter, the maritime agency’s chief said yesterday.

Malaysia, hundreds of kilo-metres to the south on the Andaman Sea, is likely to see more boat people from Myan-mar in coming weeks and months because of the renewed violence, said Zulkifli Abu Bakar, the director-general of the Malaysia Maritime Enforcement Agency.

However any such voyage would be hazardous for the next

few months, because of the annual monsoon.

“We are supposed to provide basic necessities for them to con-tinue their journey and push them away. But at the end of the day, because of humanitarian reasons, we will not be able to do that,” Zulkifli said, adding that no fresh refugees had been seen yet.

Malaysia will probably house the new arrivals in immigration detention centres, where for-eigners without documents are typically held, he said.

Malaysia, which has not signed the UN Refugee Conven-tion, treats refugees as illegal migrants.

“Malaysia will send a human-itarian mission to help refugees seeking shelter at the Bangla-desh-Myanmar border,” Prime Minister Najib Razak said.

The mission, to be led by the Malaysian armed forces, is a “manifestation of Malaysia’s strong objection of the contin-ued suppression of the Rohingya community by the Myanmar security forces,” Najib said in a statement.

“The mission will leave today to review the situation in

refugee camps. Malaysia Airlines and Malindo Air will help in the distribution of aid.”

“Malaysia will hold talks with Bangladesh to set up a military hospital at the border,” Najib added.

There are about 59,000 Rohingya refugees registered with the United Nations High

Commissioner for Refugees in Malaysia although unofficial numbers are almost double.

In the year 2015, mass graves were exhumed at jun-gle camps on the border between Thailand and Malay-sia that were thought to be mainly Rohingya victims of human traffickers.

South Korea braces for North’s new missile threatSeoul

AP

South Korea is closely watch-ing North Korea over the possibility it may launch

another intercontinental ballis-tic missile as soon as tomorrow when it celebrates its founding anniversary.

Seoul’s Unification Ministry spokeswoman Eugene Lee said that Pyongyang could potentially conduct its next ICBM tests this weekend or around October 10, another North Korean holiday

marking the founding of its rul-ing party.

North Korea has previously marked key dates with displays of military power, but now its tests appear to be driven by the need to improve missile capabilities.

The North is just coming off its sixth and the most powerful nuclear test to date on Sunday in what it claimed was a deto-nation of a thermonuclear weapon built for its ICBMs.

The country tested its devel-opmental Hwasong-14 ICBMs

twice in July and analysts say the flight data from the launches indicate the missiles could cover a broad swath of the continen-tal United States, including major cities such as Los Angeles and Chicago, when perfected.

North Korea fired the ICBMs at highly lofted angles in July to reduce ranges and avoid other countries. But South Korean offi-cials say the next launches could be conducted at angles close to operational as the North would seek to test whether the war-heads survive the harsh

conditions of atmospheric re-entry and detonate properly.

In Washington, President Donald Trump reiterated on Thursday that military action is “certainly” an option against North Korea, as his administra-tion tentatively concurred with the pariah nation’s claim to have tested a hydrogen bomb.

A senior administration offi-cial said the US was still assessing last weekend’s under-ground explosion but so far noted nothing inconsistent with Pyongyang’s claim.

5.3 magnitude earthquake hits northern JapanTokyo

AFP

A moderate 5.3-magnitude earthquake struck northern Japan yesterday night but there was no tsunami warning, Jap-anese authorities said.

“The quake was at a depth of 10km in Akita pre-fecture at 10:23pm,” Japan’s meteorological agency said yesterday.

There were no immedi-ate reports of injuries or damage, according to public broadcaster NHK.

The Japan Meteorological Agency did not issue a tsu-nami warning.

“No abnormality was reported at nuclear power facilities in the region,” NHK said.

Yingluck last seen heading towards Cambodia: GovtBangkok

AFP

A convoy believed to be carrying Thailand’s fugitive former prime minister Yingluck Shinawatra was last spotted head-ing through a military checkpoint close to the border with

Cambodia, the junta’s deputy leader said yesterday.Thailand’s first female prime minister pulled a dramatic dis-

appearing act last month on the day a court was due to deliver a verdict in her trial for criminal negligence.

Thailand’s junta has said it was unaware she was planning to flee—something analysts and many Thais have found hard to believe given the round-the-clock surveillance Yingluck frequently complained of.

Yesterday, deputy junta leader General Prawit Wongsuwon said that former premier’s convoy was last seen on CCTV at a military checkpoint in Sa Kaeo province, which borders Cambodia.

Prime Minister Najib Razak said that Malaysia will send a humanitarian mission to help refugees seeking shelter at the Bangladesh-Myanmar border.

Aid

Australia & New Zealand to beef up islands securityApia

AFP

Australia and New Zea-land announced plans yesterday to step up

security in the Pacific as the US warned of potential ter-ror threats to the region.

Speaking at the annual Pacific Islands Forum in Samoa, an attending US del-egation raised the possibility of terror groups using isolated Pacific islands as hideouts.

“That might be a place to exploit for transit through to other countries,” the US act-ing assistant secretary of state for East Asian and Pacific

affairs Susan Thornton said.“So we talked about the

importance of having good information sharing on things like electronic passports and other migration data.”

New Zealand Foreign Minister Gerry Brownlee said his nation would provide $8.41m for aviation security including equipment and training.

Australia -- which is already building 19 patrol boats to help island nations protect their waters -- announced it would fund an aerial surveillance mission to crack down on crime, partic-ularly illegal fishing.

Pakistan opens fifth nuclear plantIslamabad

AFP

Pakistani Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi yesterday inaugurated

the country’s fifth nuclear power plant, developed in col-laboration with China amid hopes that his government could end chronic power shortages this year.

Pakistan is one of the few developing countries pursuing atomic energy in the wake of

the Fukushima nuclear disas-ter in Japan in 2011, as it seeks to close an electricity shortfall that can stretch up to 7,000 MW in peak summer months, or around 32% of total demand.

The 340-megawatt Chashma-IV reactor, located some 250km southwest of cIs-lamabad, is the fourth built as part of a collaboration between the Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission (PAEC) and China National Nuclear Corporation (CNNC).

The previous power plant was inaugurated in December by former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, who was dis-qualified on corruption charges last month.

“Ending of loadshedding is the highest priority of our gov-ernment and the power projects of 10,000 megawatts would be completed by next June,” Abbasi said.

“We will be able to end loadshedding by November 2017.”

Canberra to help Manila in terror fightManila

AFP

The Philippines has wel-comed Australia’s offer to deploy troops to train Fil-

ipino soldiers, the defence ministers of the two allies said yesterday, as extremists con-tinue to terrorise parts of the country.

The announcement came as the Philippine military called yesterday for more funds to root out pro-IS group militants, more than three months into a deadly offensive devastating the south-ern city of Marawi.

Philippine Defence Secre-tary Delfin Lorenzana and his Australian counterpart Marise

Payne said Manila agreed to an offer from Canberra, made in August, for Australian troops to train local soldiers inside yet-to-be-named Filipino bases.

“We have increased our engagement, a surge if you like, in the context of the current events,” Payne said at a joint news conference with Lorenzana.

She said many areas of the Asia-Pacific were threatened by the return of “foreign fighters” who had gone to engage in com-bat in the Middle East.

“They (foreign fighters) are battle-hardened. They are well trained, they are very deter-mined,” she warned, adding that she had also discussed the threat

with Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore.

Australian Foreign Minister Julie Bishop revealed last week that she recently spoke to Pres-ident Rodrigo Duterte and offered training aid to the Phil-ippines similar to that provided to Iraq.

Lorenzana stressed that the Philippines did not need foreign troops for actual combat but said Australians could train local soldiers in information-gather-ing and analysis.

“It will not look good if we would need (foreign) troops to fight the war here,” he said.

Australia has a defence cooperation programme with the Philippines.

Australian Defence Minister Marise Payne (right) and Defence Secretary Delfin Lorenzana during their joint press conference at a military air base, in Manila, yesterday.

Protesters rally against Myanmar’s treatment of the Rohingya outside the Myanmar Embassy, in Kuala Lumpur, yesterday.

Over 1,000 feared dead in Myanmar violence: UNSeoul

AFP

More than 1,000 people may already have been killed in Myan-

mar, mostly minority Rohingya Muslims -- more than twice the government’s total -- a senior UN representative said.

In the last two weeks alone 270,000 mostly Rohingya civilians have fled to Bangla-desh, overwhelming refugee camps that were already burst-ing at the seams, the UN said.

Others have died trying to flee the fighting in Rakhine state, where witnesses say entire villages have been burned since militants launched a series of coordinated attacks on August 25, prompting a mil-itary-led crackdown.

On the basis of witness tes-timonies and the pattern of previous outbreaks of violence, said Yanghee Lee, the UN spe-cial rapporteur on human rights in Myanmar, “perhaps about a thousand or more are already dead”.

06 SATURDAY 9 SEPTEMBER 2017EUROPE

French President Emmanuel Macron greets people during his visit to central Athens’ commercial street yesterday, as part of a two-day official visit of the French president to Greece.

Macron in Athens NEWS BYTES

French fashion tycoon Pierre Berge dies aged 86PARIS: The French fashion tycoon Pierre Berge — the busi-ness brains behind the Yves Saint Laurent empire — has died aged 86, his foundation said yesterday. Berge, the longtime partner of the late designer Yves Saint Laurent, died in his sleep early Friday at his country home at Saint-Remy-de-Provence in southern France, the foundation said. A passionate bibliophile and art collector, he was also a tireless campaigner for gay rights and donated a large part of his fortune to AIDS research. Politically engaged to the end, he was an impor-tant backer and confidant of French president Francois Mitterrand, and this year threw his weight behind Emmanuel Macron’s successful campaign for the Elysee Palace. Former French culture minister Jack Lang led the tributes to a man he called a “true prince of the arts and culture”. “He was a magi-cian who made his life and those who he loved a symphony of happiness,” he said. Berge and Saint Laurent were joined in a civil union a few days before the designer died of a brain tumour in 2008 aged 71. Two museums dedicated to the life and work of Saint Laurent, financed by the foundation the two men founded, are to open in Paris and Morocco this year.

German teenager on trial for ‘darknet’ knife murdersBERLIN: A teenager went on trial in Germany yesterday accused of two knife killings that shocked the country, includ-ing the murder of a child he allegedly bragged about on the Internet. Marcel Hesse, 19, remained silent in court, but his lawyer Michael Emde said he did not deny the charges against him. Prosecutors say Hesse lured a local nine-year-old boy into his basement and stabbed him 52 times with a folding knife in March this year. He allegedly boasted about the mur-der in a video clip he published on the darknet, a hidden online arena notoriously used by criminals to trade weap-ons, drugs and child pornography. Police discovered the child’s body in Hesse’s home in the western town of Herne, spark-ing a major manhunt. Prosecutor Danyal Maibaum said Hesse, described as unemployed and socially withdrawn, was hid-ing at the home of a 22-year-old man he knew from training college. When his friend realised Hesse was a murder sus-pect on the run and said he wanted to call police, Hesse allegedly killed him too, stabbing him 68 times. Hesse later set the apartment on fire, but soon after walked into a res-taurant and shouted “call the police, I’m wanted”, media reported at the time. Security was tight at the court, which has set another 10 hearings in the trial until mid-October.

Paraplegic girl in France attacked by rats while in bedLILLE: A paraplegic teenage girl was attacked in her bed by rats which bit and scratched her hundreds of times, French police said yesterday. The 14-year-old, who was defenceless in her medical bed when the attack occurred last Friday night, suffered 225 wounds all over her body, including her face. Police in the city of Roubaix, close to the Belgian border, were told last Sunday by hospital staff that the disabled girl had been admitted, the source said. An examination by a foren-sic pathologist determined that the injuries were caused by rats which swarmed her as she lay on her bed, according to a local newspaper. The girl’s father has filed a complaint against the landlord of the house and against the city, saying that he had repeatedly asked them to remove a pile of rub-bish bins left in a nearby car park, the police source said.

First combat death in Kiev since truceKIEV: Kiev reported yesterday the first combat death since Ukraine agreed a new truce with Kremlin-backed rebels in the east of the country ahead of the start of the new school year. “As a result of active hostilities, one Ukrainian soldier was killed over the past 24 hours,” military spokesman Andriy Lysenko told journalists. “It happened during the shelling of Avdiivka”, her said, referring to a city about 10km north of the rebel stronghold of Donetsk.

Barcelona

AFP

Spain’s top courts yester-day heaped fresh threats on Catalan sep-aratists planning an independence referen-

dum, pressuring hundreds of mayors set to open their polling stations for the vote next month.

After sparking Spain’s deep-est political crisis in 40 years this week by voting to push ahead with the referendum, Catalonia’s separatist-controlled regional parliament upped the ante by passing a bill early yesterday outlining a transition to a possi-ble independent republic.

The separatists say the leg-islation would serve as a temporary “basic law” in the wealthy northeastern region in the event of a “yes” vote on Octo-ber 1, serving until a new constitution is in place. The

referendum push has sparked fury in Madrid.

“There will be no independ-ence referendum of any kind in Catalonia,” Defence Minister Maria Dolores de Cospedal

vowed yesterday. She said the central government would fight what it branded “provocations” with “all necessary legal means”.

Asked if it would potentially trigger article 115 of Spain’s con-stitution — an extreme step that would allow it to partially sus-pend Catalonia’s autonomy — government spokesman Inigo Mendez de Vigo said Madrid was “not ruling anything out”. Spain’s Constitutional Court has since 2014 declared any bid for an independence referendum to be unconstitutional. On Thursday night, it moved again to suspend the bills passed by Catalan law-makers to organise the vote.

But the separatists have ignored the actions of the judges — most of them named by the ruling conservatives — branding them illegitimate.

“It is worrying that the state is seeking to scare people and make threats, faced with the

desire for a vote,” Lluis Corom-inas, vice president of the Catalan parliament, told national radio.

Catalan prosecutors yester-day urged the local appeals court to launch proceedings against the separatist regional president Carles Puigdemont and the 12 members of his government on accusations of disobedience, malpractice and misuse of pub-lic funds. The Supreme Court has meanwhile ordered senior Cat-alan officials to desist from any actions that further the referen-dum bid, warning they could otherwise face criminal charges.

The warning went out to all members of the regional govern-ment, as well as mayors, the directors of regional public broadcasters, and Catalan police chief Josep Lluis Trapero, a pop-ular figure after winning plaudits for his handling of last month’s terror attacks in Barcelona and Cambrils. The region’s 948

mayors now find themselves in a delicate position, having been asked by regional authorities just a day earlier to provide lists of possible polling stations.

Neus Lloveras, mayor of the town of Vilanova outside Barce-lona who heads an association of pro-independence municipalities, said more than 600 town halls have signalled they will take part in the vote. Others have said they will refuse to organise a banned referendum, such as Angel Ros, mayor of the town of Lerida.

“We would be leaving the legal framework,” he told TV3 television. “Is it worth trying to build a state in order to divide the country? I’m among those who think not.” Barcelona’s left-ist mayor Ada Colau has yet to announce if the vote will be allowed to take place in the regional capital.

She accused Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy of having an

“incapacity or lack of will” to find “a political solution to a political conflict”, but she has also called on separatists not to seek their goal at any cost, even if it means bitterly dividing the region. With its own language and customs, Catalonia accounts for about one-fifth of Spain’s economic output, and already has signifi-cant powers over matters such as education and healthcare.

But Spain’s economic wor-ries, coupled with a perception that the region’s 7.5 million peo-ple pay more in taxes to Madrid than they get in return, have helped push the independence question to centre stage.

Catalonia remains divided, however. In a survey by the Cat-alan Centre of Opinion Studies in June, 41.1 percent backed inde-pendence while 49.9 percent rejected it. Some 70 percent wanted a referendum, however, to settle the question once and for all.

Berlin

AFP

Britain’s former UKIP party leader Nigel Farage yes-terday said that Germans

should lead a revolt against Brussels as he joined a campaign rally of the anti-immigration and eurosceptic AfD party.

Farage said he was amazed Brexit had barely figured in debates between Chancellor Angela Merkel and her centre-left challenger Martin Schulz, the former European Parliament

president, whom he labelled “a pro-EU fanatic”, ahead of Sep-tember 24 elections.

“It’s all too embarrassing to admit that their beloved Euro-pean project is now about to be exited by one of the big coun-tries,” said Farage, whose UK Independence Party was the driving force that led to Britain’s shock vote to leave the European Union in 2019.

Farage insisted he was at the Alternative for Germany (AfD) event at the “personal invitation” of his fellow European

Parliament member, the AfD’s Beatrix von Storch, the grand-daughter of Hitler’s finance minister Lutz von Krosigk.

Farage said he wanted “to get a proper debate going in the biggest, richest, most impor-tant and powerful country in Europe about not just the shape of Brexit but perhaps even the shape of the European project to come”.

He said Germany, as the big-gest EU economy, should “say to Brussels: look, the reason the Brits left is because you’re

behaving so badly, you’re tak-ing away so much of people’s freedom, l iberty and democracy”.

But Farage charged that Ger-many “hasn’t had the debate” about Europe and “about break-ing the closed shop” of EU bureaucrats. “We managed to break it in the United Kingdom. At the moment Germany is at a point where it is very, very to tough to break through,” he said, adding however that “I predict, in Germany, it will probably start in Bavaria”.

Catalonia vote: Madrid ups pressure on separatists

Budapest

AFP

After days of fierce rhet-oric, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban

said yesterday that his govern-ment “respected” an EU court’s rejection of Hungary’s chal-lenge to a migrant relocation plan, but vowed to fight on against the measure.

“Hungary is a European Union member, so the bloc’s treaties must be respected and the court’s rulings must be acknowledged,” the pop-ulist leader said in a radio interview. “But this is not a reason to change an immigra-tion policy that rejects migrants,” Orban said.

“The court’s ruling does not require Hungary to do anything”, he added, because it focused only on whether the EU had the legal right to enforce refugee quotas.

The “real battle (against Brussels) is just beginning,” he added.

The European Court of Justice threw out the chal-lenge from Hungary and Slovakia against the EU’s scheme to spread up to 160,000 Syrian, Iraqi and Eri-trean asylum seekers among the 28 member states.

Brussels approved the deal in 2015 when more than one million people landed on Europe’s shores, mainly in Italy and Greece.

But recent EU figures show that just under 28,000 migrants had been relocated from Italy and Greece by Sep-tember this year.

Describing immigration as “poison”, Orban has been at the forefront of a rebellion in eastern and central Europe against the quotas.

London

Reuters

Nine months after Prime Minister Theresa May invited President Donald

Trump for a formal state visit to Britain, no arrangements have yet been made and there is no sign of the visit taking place soon, US and British officials said.

Discussions between Wash-ington and London about a Trump visit have continued, said one official who asked not to be named, but so far the White House has not signalled when and how the president wants to proceed.

May’s invitation to Trump during a visit to Washington a

few days after he took office sparked controversy in Britain. Just hours after she left the White House, Trump announced his widely-criticized ban on travel from Muslim-majority countries.

Such is the controversy that some officials on both sides of the Atlantic are privately hav-ing second thoughts about the visit, worried about street dem-onstrations that might greet Trump in London and other British cities. “There have been signs of relief in some quarters that he has yet to appear on Her Majesty’s schedule,” said a Brit-ish official.

Given Trump’s penchant for showmanship and his

pre-presidential visits to the two golf courses he owns in Scot-land, many Trump-watchers expected Britain to be one of the first stops on any presidential European tour.

White House representatives told British officials at the time of the invite that Trump had accepted. But a senior US gov-ernment official told Reuters in July that Trump had no plans to visit Britain in the near future.

A full-scale state visit to Brit-ain involves considerable pomp. Upon arriving in London, the president would be greeted by Queen Elizabeth and other members of the Royal Family at a ceremony near the Houses of Parliament.

UKIP’s Farage rallies Germany’s right-wing AfD

Trump visit to Britain still unfixed nine months after May’s invitation

Orban ‘respects’ EU migrant ruling but vows to fight on

Tensions boil

Catalonia’s separatist-controlled regional parliament upped the ante by passing a bill early yesterday outlining a transition to a possible independent republic.

The Supreme Court has ordered senior Catalan officials to desist from any actions that further the referendum bid, warning they could otherwise face criminal charges.

07SATURDAY 9 SEPTEMBER 2017 AMERICAS

Miami

AFP

Florida’s highways were jammed yesterday with families fleeing their homes as Hurricane Irma honed in on the Sunshine

State after reducing island resorts to rubble and killing at least 17 peo-ple across the Caribbean.

Bumper-to-bumper traffic snaked north out of the peninsula, with mattresses, gas cans, mat-tresses and kayaks strapped to car roofs, as residents heeded increas-ingly insistent warnings to get out and Florida’s governor said all of the state’s 20.6 million inhabitants should be prepared to evacuate. “Hurricane Irma is of epic propor-tion, perhaps bigger than we have ever seen,” US President Donald Trump warned on Twitter. “Be safe and get out of its way, if possible.”

Roaring across the Caribbean, the monster storm laid waste to a series of tiny islands like Saint Bar-thelemy and Saint Martin, where 60 percent of homes were wrecked and scenes of looting have broken out, before slamming into the Vir-gin Islands and Puerto Rico.

“Houses are smashed, the air-port is out of action, telephone and electricity poles are on the ground,” Olivier Toussaint, a resident of Saint-Barthelemy, said.

Irma was downgraded over-night from a rare Category Five storm to a still-deadly Category Four, and continued to pack extremely dangerous winds of 150 miles per hour (240km per hour).

Forecasters warned of storm surges of up to 25 feet above nor-mal tide levels, as the hurricane

bears down for a direct hit on southern Florida, where the mass exodus is being complicated by gridlock and fuel shortages.

Normally bustling Miami Beach was deserted and storefronts were boarded up with plywood, some bearing graffiti reading “Say no to Irma” or “You don’t scare us Irma”.

Police cars crawled the coastal roads of West Palm Beach, blaring out “Attention, attention, this is a mandatory evacuation zone, please evacuate.” In Georgia, Governor Nathan Deal ordered a mandatory evacuation of the city of Savannah, which has a population of around 150,000 people, and other coastal areas.

According to the latest trajec-tory from the Miami-based National Hurricane Center, Irma is expected to strike the Florida Keys late today before moving inland. At 11am (1500 GMT) yesterday, the

hurricane was over the northern edge of Cuba and the central Baha-mas and heading northwest at around 14 miles per hour.

In the Caribbean, violent winds ripped roofs and facades off build-ings, hurling lumps of concrete, cars and even shipping containers aside. At least two people were killed in Puerto Rico, and more than half of its three million resi-dents were without power after rivers broke their banks in the center and north of the island. Another four people were killed on the US Virgin Islands. One person died in tiny Barbuda where 30 per-cent of properties were demolished and 300 people had been evacu-ated to Antigua. France said at least nine had been killed across its Car-ibbean territories. Six out of 10 homes were left uninhabitable, with insurers in Paris estimating their overall costs would likely be “much higher” than $240m.

Britain’s defence ministry said it was sending two military transport planes to the region carrying person-nel, supplies and recovery equipment. European nations quickly mobilized to help their citizens in the Caribbean, with France and the Netherlands ordering hundreds of extra police to St Martin to tackle an outbreak of looting amid major shortages of food, water and petrol.

In the Dominican Republic, tor-rential rain and powerful winds left 17 districts cut off, with nearly 20,000 people evacuated and more than 100 houses destroyed. And in Cuba, some 10,000 foreign tourists were evacuated from beach resorts as authorities hiked the disaster alert level to maximum.

Washington

AFP

The US House of Representatives passed a $15 billion hurricane relief package yester-day that included raising the debt ceiling

and funding government until early December, sending the bill to President Donald Trump.

Lawmakers voted 316 to 90 to approve the package, which was the result of an agreement struck between Trump and congressional Dem-ocrats in a hurried effort to free up emergency funding in the wake of Hurricane Harvey, and as a second monster storm bears down on Florida.

“The House just voted to send critical aid to the victims of #HurricaneHarvey. Next stop ? @POTUS,” House Speaker Paul Ryan said in a tweet, referring to the president. The Senate easily passed

the measure on Thursday, 80 to 17.If Trump signs the bill, as expected, it would

extend US borrowing authority and prevent a gov-ernment shutdown by funding federal operations until December 8, and free up emergency relief funding just as Florida braces for a direct hit from Hurricane Irma. Congress’s immediate focus how-ever was funnelling sufficient funding to government authorities like the Federal Emer-gency Management Administration, which has been helping thousands of victims of Hurricane Harvey that pummelled Texas late last month.

Of the $15.25bn in relief funding, about half is designated for FEMA’s disaster relief fund. FEMA has burned through much of its disaster funding, due to the scope of Harvey and technical advance-ments that allow the agency to distribute money more quickly than in previous disasters.

Hundreds of people gather in an emergency shelter at the Miami-Dade County Fair Expo Center in Miami, Florida, yesterday, ahead of Hurricane Irma. RIGHT: Hurricane Irma is driving toward Florida passing the eastern end of Cuba in this Nasa’s GOES-16 satellite image taken at about 0800 EDT yesterday.

Florida mass exodus as Irma closes in

Aerial view of devastation following Hurricane Irma at Bitter End in Virgin Gorda, British Virgin Islands, yesterday, is seen in this still image taken from social media video.

US Congress okays $15bn hurricane relief package

Florida

Reuters

Airlines were racing against the clock to clear as many customers as pos-sible from the likely Florida path of

Hurricane Irma, as social and political pressure mounted for carriers to play a bigger role in aiding evacuations.

Airlines ramped up the number of flights available out of south Florida air-ports, where operations were likely to

temporarily cease through the week-end and beyond. But flights out of the area remained extremely limited. At Miami International Airport, many out-bound flights were cancelled, leaving residents scrambling to rebook to any-where outside the path of the storm.

American Airlines, which has one of the larger operations in south Florida, said it had added 16 flights out of Miami, amid more than 2,400 forced cancella-tions through Monday.

Delta Air Lines Inc said it had upsized aircraft and added flights to increase the number of available out-going seats by 2,000. United Airlines added six flights out of Miami to its hubs, including Newark, New Jersey, and Chi-cago O’Hare. All three carriers said they planned to mostly wind down south Florida operations soon.

A Delta-operated flight from New York to San Juan, Puerto Rico, and back, made headlines for narrowly avoiding

the storm in a mission to evacuate another plane-full of passengers from the area ahead of Irma’s landfall.

As residents sought to secure last-minute flights out of the dangerous Category 5 storm’s path, airlines faced accusations of trying to capitalize on the panic and chaos by price gouging.

But while airlines offered some cheap flights out of south Florida after complaints, passengers said that did lit-tle good if all the flights were fully

booked or cancelled. Medical student Eric Slabaugh said he was dismayed by ticket prices over $2,000 when he started looking for flights. He got a ticket to Detroit for $700, he said, “because nobody wants to go there”.

Also affected by the storm, Carnival Cruise Lines, which has major opera-tions out of Florida ports, said it had cancelled four of its Caribbean cruises, though it still planned to operate sev-eral more under modified itineraries.

US airlines scramble to evacuate residents ahead of hurricane

Trump plea

“Hurricane Irma is of epic proportion, perhaps bigger than we have ever seen,” US President Donald Trump warned on Twitter. “Be safe and get out of its way, if possible.”

According to the latest trajectory from the Miami-based National Hurricane Center, Irma is expected to strike the Florida Keys late today before moving inland.

08 SATURDAY 9 SEPTEMBER 2017VIEWS

E S T A B L I S H E D I N 1 9 9 6

QUOTE OF THE DAY

Venezuela will take a position to defend the judicial and financial security of the republic and its investors or holders of financial instruments.

Nicolas MaduroVenezuelan President

E S T A B L I S H E D I N 1 9 9 6

CHAIRMANSHEIKH THANI BIN ABDULLAH AL THANI

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

editorinchief@pen.com.qa

ACTING MANAGING EDITORMOHAMMED SALIM MOHAMED

msalim@pen.com.qa

Ideally, Aung San Suu Kyi should be squirming in her seat. Such is the intensity and quantum of global outrage against her silence over the genocide of Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar that

she should be doing something to please the world. And Suu Kyi is no ordinary leader. She is a Nobel Peace Prize winner, who has been rewarded for her fight for justice and freedom. That a leader of her stature has become so thick-skinned and shows scant regard in the face of persecution of a community under her rule speaks volumes about her lack of commitment to the ideals she professes to expound.

Suu Kyi is facing intense international criticism over the persecution of Rohingyas in Myanmar. A growing number of world leaders, especially those engaged in the fight for human rights, have come out against her inhuman silence.

Earlier this week, Malala Yousafzai called on Suu Kyi to act to “stop the violence” against the Rohingya. “I am still waiting for my fellow Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi to do the same. The world is waiting and the Rohingya Muslims are waiting,” Malala said.

A couple of days later, Desmond Tutu, a veteran of the fight against apartheid in South Africa, joined Malala in condemning Suu Kyi. He said Suu Kyi’s “silence” was “too steep” a price to pay for her posi-tion and called on her “to be courageous and resilient again”. Tutu, who retired in 2010, said he

was breaking a vow to “remain silent on public affairs out of profound sadness” for the plight of the Rohingya.

These pleas for action coincide with an ongoing global campaign demanding the revoca-tion of the Nobel Prize awarded to Suu Kyi to protest her complicity in the crimes against humanity. Several West-ern columnists and writers, who have so far refrained from making such a demand, are sign-

ing a global petition now. “This week, to my own astonishment, I found myself signing a petition for the revocation of her Nobel peace prize.

I believe the Nobel committee should retain responsibility for the prizes it awards, and withdraw them if its laureates later violate the principles for which they were recognized,” writes George Monbiot in the Guardian.

Sadly, the global outrage and condemnations have failed to move Suu Kyi. She remains stubborn in her refusal to act, and seems to be gripped by a fear of the local Buddhist extremists who are out to ethnically cleanse the Rohingya. It’s surprising and deplorable that she can show such insensitivity and callous disregard for the plight of a persecuted minority.

The UN has described the Rohingya as “the world’s most persecuted minority” and their suffer-ing is continuing and multiplying even amidst all this international attention.

Suu Kyi’s cruel silence

Suu Kyi remains stubborn in her refusal to help the Rohingya despite the global outrage against her silence and inaction.

ED ITOR IAL

Just over a week after US President Don-ald Trump announced the deployment of additional US troops to Afghanistan, US army servicemen in Alaska were already preparing for deployment to the region.

The Fourth Brigade Combat Team, 25th Infan-try Division is to provide at least 1,000 of the 4,000 additional soldiers announced by the president as part of the continuation of the war.

Even as additional troops get ready to deploy, the United States continues to be without a clear plan as to what it is hoping to accomplish, with defence officials at the Pentagon saying that they are “not prepared to move forward” with the president’s plan and that critical planning was “still under way”. In the meantime, Taliban spokesper-son Zabihullah Mujahid respondedto Trump’s statement by telling him to take US troops back home because “the Taliban could not be defeated.”

It is a smug statement to make, but in the case of the Tehreek-e-Taliban Afghanistan, it could well be true. In March of this year, the group released a report citing how much territory it controlled. According to the report, 211 of Afghanistan’s administrative districts were in the group’s control or were contested. The estimate was not overblown; a comparison with media reports and esti-mates released (pdf) by the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) shows that they estimate contested and Taliban-controlled districts at 171, not very far from the Taliban number. Either way, then, nearly 16 years of US occupation and the expenditure of nearly $840.7bn (at the end of budget year 2018), the Taliban remains undefeated and possibly undefeatable.

The question of why, however, is not one most Americans or even the war planners seem interested in considering. Some acknowledge the reality that military solu-tions are not the answer, and yet seem willing to lobby for deployments of addi-tional forces, while blaming past presidents (Obama) and intransigent neighbours (Paki-stan). The truth is distant from all of these analytical directions and centres on a com-plex amalgam of the beliefs and proclivities of the US military and the reality of Afghani-stan’s own normal of constant war.

First among these is the fact that 16 years into the war in Afghanistan, US soldiers find it hard to buy into the moral justifications that they are given for their deployment there. Osama bin Laden is dead and the “war on terror” turned out to be a deadly fiasco. What justifies US military presence in Afghanistan now?

US soldiers were told that they were the “good guys” showing up in Iraq and Afghani-stan to build democracies, create institutions and establish the rule of law.

The reality of Afghanistan is much differ-ent. The ensuing gap between the lie told to gear soldiers up for war and the war itself

The Taliban: Undefeated, and possibly undefeatableRafia Zakaria Al Jazeera

seems ever widening and feeding the doubt and disenchantment of soldiers who have yet to deploy. A president like Trump may rhetorically disavow nation building but he has failed to answer the ensuing question: If the war is no longer to build Afghanistan, then what exactly is it for?

The generals at the Pentagon and the war bureaucrats in Washington and Kabul will, of course, never acknowl-edge that the near trillion-dollar price tag of the war in Afghanistan has been for naught. As recently as a year ago, General John Nicholson, the current commander, insisted that “overall our mission in Afghanistan is on a positive trajectory”. In April of this year, Anthony Box, a Department of Defense adviser lent out to the Afghan govern-ment, boasted, “citizens trust in Government is an all time high”.

It was an astounding statement to make, given that the United Nations reports that violence against civilians in Afghanistan reached its highest levels in 2016. Statements like these, reveal the proclivity to create artificial advances where no actual ones can be found.

Americans whose jobs and pres-tige depend on the war’s success do not wish to acknowledge its failures. Similarly, Afghans, who benefit from the war and aid economies created by the influx of billions of dollars, are

eager to goad them on, interested in extending their own well-being as the haves in a country of have-nots.

None of it, of course, is a real suc-cess in the sense of being locally sustainable once the influx of US cash is gone. Taliban leaders know this, of course, and they also know that other Afghans know this. Unlike American soldiers, unused to the terrain, ignorant of the language and culture and increasingly confused about why they are there at all, the Taliban is adept at framing its fight as the fight for an authentically Islamic and indigenously Afghan homeland.

As a recent study by Yale political scientist Jason Lyall establishes, Afghans have an extremely strong group identity. The consequence of this is that harm inflicted by foreign forces in the country weakened support for those forces and increased support for the Taliban. However, harm inflicted by the Taliban does not translate into increased support for foreign forces.

This last fact may actually make a complete Taliban victory in Afghanistan even more likely following Trump’s dis-avowal of nation building as the supposed prerogative for the US pres-ence in the country.

Not only will US troops being deployed to the country face an even larger dose of doubt and disillusion-ment in the face of risking their lives for some murky strategic motive, but Afghans, confronted with a foreign army waging war for the sake of war, will likely flock to the Taliban in even greater numbers. The Taliban, whose recruits know the terrain because it is their own and have long-embraced war as its normal, will be waiting with open arms to welcome them.

The US plan for Afghanistan may not “be there yet” but the Taliban’s is there, and tragically for those Afghans who oppose it, it is there to stay.

The writer is a lawyer and author of

The Upstairs Wife: An Intimate History

of Pakistan; and Veil.

The US plan for Afghanistan may not ‘be there yet’ but the Taliban is there, and tragically for those Afghans who oppose it, it is there to stay.

Afghan commandos wait for their turn during live firing exercises at Camp Morehead on the outskirts of Kabul.

09SATURDAY 9 SEPTEMBER 2017 OPINION

Orleans, which seems to have become a perma-nently smaller city after Hurricane Katrina in 2005, is the exception.

What about the fates of individuals affected by major storms? The best study we have, conducted by economist Steven Levitt and co-authors, found that within a few years, Katrina victims’ incomes fully recovered.

Additional research found that people who relocated after Katrina (often to Houston, by the way) often improved their incomes. I wouldn’t expect those same income upgrades after Hurri-cane Harvey, because Houston is a wealthier and better-managed city than was New Orleans. Still, Americans have a remarkable ability to bounce back and rebuild their lives and job prospects.

Perhaps the most important lesson is just how much general prosperity matters. While Harvey raged, monsoon-related floods in India, Bangladesh and Nepal killed at least 1,200 peo-ple and left millions homeless. To the extent matters are less tragic in Texas and Louisiana, it is in large part because the US is a wealthier society with stronger infrastructure, better built homes and more sophisticated response capabilities.

A big question after Hurricane Harvey, however, is whether our modern system of public and private flood insurance is adequate to the task, and whether rebuilding incentives

Bangladesh wants safe zones to ease Rohingya crisis

Bangladesh has proposed creating “safe zones” run by aid groups for Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar’s Rakhine state to stop hundreds of thousands of refugees crossing into its territory following a mili-

tary crackdown.The plan, the latest in a string of ideas floated by

Dhaka, is unlikely to get much traction in Myanmar, where many consider the Rohingya community of 1.1 million as illegal immigrants from Bangladesh. That will leave Bangladesh, one of the poorest nations in the world, with little choice but to open new camps for refugees.

Dhaka sent the proposal to the Myanmar gov-ernment through the International Committee of the Red Cross to secure three areas in Rakhine, home to the Rohingya community, suggesting that people displaced by the violence be relocated there under the supervision of an international organisation, such as the United Nations.

“The logic of the creation of such zones is that no Rohingya can come inside Bangladesh,” said Sha-hidul Haque, Bangladesh’s foreign secretary, the top civil servant in the foreign ministry.

The Red Cross confirmed that it had passed on the request to Myanmar but said that it was a politi-cal decision for the two countries to make.

A Myanmar government spokesman did not respond to a request for comment.

Hundreds of thousands of Rohingya have fled to Bangladesh, a mostly Muslim nation of 160 million, from Buddhist-majority Myanmar in recent years.

The decades-old conflict in Rakhine flared most recently on August 25, when Rohingya insurgents

attacked several police posts and an army base. Since then, an estimated 270,000 Rohingya have fled to Bangladesh, according to the UN High Com-missioner for Refugees, joining more than 400,000 others already living there in cramped makeshift camps since the early 1990s.

There are widespread fears that tens of thou-sands more could try to cross if the violence doesn’t abate. Recent pictures from the border between the two countries show hundreds of Rohingya men, women and children trying to cross over into Bang-ladesh on foot and by boat.

The humanitarian crisis next door has left Bang-ladesh scrambling to deal with people that it does not welcome either.

In recent days, Bangladesh officials have said they plan to go ahead with a controversial plan to develop an isolated, flood-prone island in the Bay of Bengal to temporarily house tens of thousands of refugees, drawing fresh criticism from the interna-tional community.

Temporary ShelterIt bowed to pressure on Thursday, with govern-

ment officials saying that Dhaka would now make another 1,500 acres (607 hectares) of land available for camps to house refugees near Cox’s Bazar, where many refugees already live as it is near the border

with Myanmar. “They will be given temporary shel-ter,” said Kazi Abdur Rahman, additional deputy commissioner of Cox’s Bazar. But Rahman added that the refugees would be fingerprinted and con-fined to the camp so that they did not mix with the local community.

These measures, however, do not offer a long-term solution to the crisis, and Dhaka says it is getting little support from its neighbour, which has been accused of trying to engineer ethnic cleansing within its borders.

Bangladesh officials said they had proposed joint patrolling along the border but did not receive a response from Myanmar. Earlier this week, Bangla-desh lodged a protest after it said Myanmar had laid landmines near the border between the two countries.

Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi, a Nobel Lau-reate, has come under pressure to halt violence against Rohingya. She has said that her government was doing its best to protect everyone in Rakhine but did not refer specifically to the Rohingya exodus.

“The solution lies in Myanmar. The UN hopes that Myanmar can address the root causes of the problem,” said Shinji Kubo, head of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees in Bangla-desh. Kubo said the Bangladesh government was doing its best by accepting the refugees instead of

As the rain and wind from Hurricane Harvey clear out, and the physical and human toll becomes clear, it’s worth looking at what

research tells us about storms and their costs. In particular, recovery and resilience are often stronger forces than we expect.

The storm, although described as an unprecedented weather event for the US, isn’t leading to general forecasts of a recession. The stock market reaction has been muted, even though Houston is the nation’s fourth largest city.

A Bloomberg survey of economists this week found that they expect US gross domestic product growth to slow in the third quarter, thanks to the storm, and then pick up in the fourth quarter as rebuilding gets under way.

But the research shows natural disas-ters are not good for economic growth. The resources that go into rebuilding after a big storm could have been used elsewhere, and there is no good reason to think that an economy, either at the national or regional level, will come out ahead.

That said, the future after a big storm doesn’t have to be so grim. One body of research looks at how cities bounce back from natural and man-made catastrophes. If we consider the 1871 Chicago fire, the 1906 San Fran-cisco earthquake, the 1889 Johnstown flood, or the 1900 Galveston hurricane, after rebuilding periods economic progress continued in each case. Even the bombings of Japanese cities during World War II didn’t affect their longer-term economic futures very much. New

Experience shows the US can weather the storm

A view of newly built makeshift shelters at the Kutupalong Rohingya refugee camp in the Bangladeshi district of Ukhia.

need to change. By some estimates, about 80 percent of the victims do not have flood insurance. Damage to homes thus will devastate many families’ savings. Given the extreme and unprecedented nature of the storm, it is not clear what kind of preparation might have been reasonable to expect.

Greater federal aid to the victims is a likely option. Still, it will not be obvious to many Americans why those who lost homes might end up receiving higher government benefits than people elsewhere who never had homes in the first place, and who may have inferior income prospects, especially if they live in rural areas.

Many Texas congressional representatives voted against federal aid when Hurricane Sandy hit New York and New Jersey in 2012. That sounds cruel, but we also have to guard against the tendency for aid decisions to be driven by media cycles rather than the nation’s most serious structural problems.

One commonly discussed “economist’s solution” is to limit federal bailouts, and get the federal govern-ment out of providing flood insurance, in the hope that homes will not be built on risky floodplains. It doesn’t make sense to have $663,000 in payouts sent to one Mississippi home, which has flooded out 34 times in 32 years.

That all makes sense in theory, but it also illus-trates the limitations of economics. The homes are already built in precarious places, and in the Houston area the damage has already incurred. Are we prepared to forgo giving federal aid, just to set a precedent for the future?

If anything, acting tough could lead to a backlash against the politicians who do so, and make it all the more clear that future bailouts will be forthcoming. Maybe the best we can do is to price flood insurance more appropriately, in recognition that climate risks are higher now. Over the longer run, as housing stocks turn over, that will help limit homeowner and also fiscal exposure to extreme events.

So while our current response capabilities are better than we might think, improving that performance very much won’t be easy.

The writer is a Bloomberg view columnist. He is a profes-

sor of economics at George Mason University and writes

for the blog Marginal Revolution. His books include “The

Complacent Class: The Self-Defeating Quest for the

American Dream.”

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sending them back.Bangladesh officials are turning

to the international community for help, claiming support from coun-tries such as Turkey, which has promised aid.

On Friday, a Malaysian coast guard official said the country will not turn away Rohingya Muslims and is willing to provide them tem-porary shelter. But any such voyage would be hazardous for the next few months, because of the annual monsoon.

“The world community must come forward to help them, not by putting pressure on Bangladesh but by putting pressure on Myanmar not to resort to these atrocities and violence,” said H.T. Imam, a senior aide to Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina.

“The only solution is to force Myanmar to take back their citi-zens through international pressure. And we are working with our partners on that,” Imam said.

Besides the creation of interna-tionally-controlled safe zones in Rakhine state, Bangladesh has also mooted creating a buffer zone along the border, where the inter-national community could set up camps and provide for the refu-gees, the officials said. Further details of the plan could not be learned.

“We will give aid agencies access. But we are not interested to give them shelter here. We are already overburdened,” said Mostafa Kamal Uddin, Bangla-desh’s home secretary.

Tyler Cowen Bloomberg

Serajul Quadir, Ruma Paul & Krishna N DasReuters

The world community must come forward to help them, not by putting pressure on Bangladesh but by putting pressure on Myanmar not to resort to these atrocities and violence. The only solution is to force Myanmar to take back their citizens through international pressure.

Research shows natural disasters are not good for economic growth. The resources that go into rebuilding after a big storm could have been used elsewhere, and there is no good reason to think that an economy, either at the national or regional level, will come out ahead.

10 SATURDAY 9 SEPTEMBER 2017AMERICAS

Juchitan

Agencies

At least 58 people were killed when the most powerful earthquake to hit Mexico in dec-ades tore through

buildings, forced mass evacua-tions and triggered alerts as far away as Southeast Asia.

The 8.1 magnitude quake off the southern coast late on Thurs-day was stronger than a

devastating 1985 temblor that flat-tened swathes of Mexico City and killed thousands. This time, dam-age to the city was limited, as the quake was deeper and further from the capital, but still shocking.

“The National Emergency Committee is currently report-ing 58 deaths from the September 7 earthquake,” the agency’s director, Luis Felipe Puente, wrote on Twitter: 45 in the state of Oaxaca, 10 in Chia-pas and three in Tabasco.

The Chiapas governor reported 12 deaths there, how-ever. Officials warned the toll could continue to rise as rescue workers search for bodies in the rubble in the three southern states that were hardest hit. “It almost knocked me over,” said Gildardo Arenas Rios, a 64-year-old security guard in Mexico City’s Juarez neighborhood, who was making his rounds when buildings began moving.

The southern town of Juch-itan in Oaxaca state, near the epicenter, was hit particularly hard, with sections of the town hall, a hotel, a bar and other buildings reduced to rubble.

“The situation is Juchitan is critical; this is the most terrible moment in its history,” the town’s mayor, Gloria Sanchez

said, after the long, rumbling quake that also shook Guatemala and El Salvador.

A spokesman for emergency services said seven people died east of Oaxaca in the state of Chi-apas, where thousands of people living on the coast were evacu-ated from homes as a precaution when the quake sparked tsunami warnings. Waves rose as high as 2.3 ft in Mexico, the Pacific Tsu-nami Warning Center said, though that threat passed.

State oil company Pemex said it was checking for damage at its installations. President Enrique Pena Nieto said operations at the Salina Cruz refinery in the same region as the epicenter were tem-porarily suspended as a precautionary measure. Two children died north of Chiapas in Tabasco state, the local governor said. At least 250 people in Oax-aca were also injured, according to agriculture minister Jose Cal-zada. Classes were suspended in

much of central and southern Mexico on Friday to allow authorities to review damage.

In one central neighbour-hood of Mexico City, dozens of people stood outside after the quake, some wrapped in blan-kets against the cool night air. Children were crying. Liliana Villa, 35, who was in her apart-ment when the quake struck, fled to the street in her nightclothes. “It felt horrible, and I thought, ‘this (building) is going to fall,’” she said. The US Geological Sur-vey (USGS) said the 8.1 magnitude quake had its epi-center in the Pacific, 87km southwest of the town of Pijijia-pan at a depth of 43 miles.

Allen Husker, a seismologi-cal expert at the geophysical institute of the National Auton-omous University of Mexico, said the quake had rewritten the record books. “It’s the worst quake (in Mexico) in more than 100 years,” Husker said.

Across the Pacific Ocean, the national disaster agency of the Philippines put the country’s east-ern seaboard on alert for possible tsunamis, though in the end no evacuations were ordered. Res-cue workers laboured through the night in badly affected areas to look for people who were

possibly trapped in collapsed buildings. By early yesterday, the human cost of Mexican quake appeared to be less severe than many far less powerful tremors.

Windows were shattered at Mexico City airport and power went out in several neighbor-hoods of the capital, affecting more than one million people. The cornice of a hotel came down in the southern tourist city of Oaxaca, a witness said.

People in Mexico City, one of the world’s largest cities, ran out into the streets in pajamas and alarms sounded after the quake struck just before midnight. “I had never been anywhere where the earth moved so much. At first I laughed, but when the lights went out, I didn’t know what to do,” said Luis Carlos Briceno, an architect, 31, who was visiting Mexico City. “I nearly fell over.”

Helicopters buzzed overhead looking for damage to the city, which is built on a spongy, drained lake bed. Authorities reported dozens of aftershocks, and President Pena Nieto said the quake was felt by around 50 million of Mexico’s roughly 120 million population, with further aftershocks likely. He advised people to check their homes and offices for damage and gas leaks.

Washington

Reuters

The US Senate Appropri-ations Committee passed a spending bill

late on Thursday that includes $10m to help fund the United Nations’ climate change body that oversees the Paris Cli-mate Agreement, despite President Donald Trump’s decision to stop funding it.

The 30-member Senate panel, which allocates federal funds to various government agencies and organizations, approved a $51bn spending bill for the State Department and foreign operations, which included an amendment to continue funding the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change as well as the scientific body the Intergov-ernmental Panel on Climate Change.

The amendment passed even though the 2018 budget proposal that Trump, a Repub-lican, introduced earlier this year eliminated support of any mechanism to finance climate change projects in developing countries and organizations.

The United States is still a party to the 1992 UNFCCC, which oversees the Paris agreement.

New York Reuters

A US appeals court on Thursday rejected the Trump administration’s

effort to temporarily bar most refugees from entering the country, ruling that those who have relationships with a reset-tlement agency should be exempt from an executive order banning refugees.

A three-judge 9th US Circuit Court of Appeals panel also ruled that grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins of legal U.S. resi-dents should be exempted from President Donald Trump’s order, which banned travelers from six Muslim-majority countries.

The ruling is the latest legal blow to the President’s sweep-ing executive order barring travelers from Iran, Syria, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen for 90 days, which the Republican president said was necessary for national security.

The Justices said that the government did not persuasively explain why the travel ban should be enforced against close rela-tives of people from the six countries or refugees with

guarantees from resettlement agencies. The 3-0 ruling takes effect in five days. The US Supreme Court ruled in June that Trump’s ban could be imple-mented on a limited basis, but should not be applied to people with “bona fide” relationships to people or entities in the US.

The government took a nar-row view of that interpretation, which the state of Hawaii chal-lenged in court. A lower court judge sided with Hawaii, and the 9th Circuit judges upheld that view. “It is hard to see how a grandparent, grandchild, aunt, uncle, niece, nephew, sibling-in-law, or cousin can be considered to have no bona fide relationship with their relative in the United States,” the court said.

The court also rejected the administration’s argument that the written assurances provided by resettlement agencies obligat-ing them to provide services for specific refugees is not a bona fide relationship. The agencies’ advance preparation and expenditure of resources for each refugee “supports the district court’s determination that a bona fide relationship with the refu-gee exists,” the decision said.

Soldiers stand guard a few metres away from the Sensacion Hotel which collapsed with the powerful earthquake that struck Mexico overnight, in Matias Romero, Oaxaca State. RIGHT: People look on at a destroyed car in Juchitan de Zaragoza.

58 dead in powerful Mexico earthquake

Washington

AFP

Hillary Clinton (pictutred) takes responsibility for her devastating loss to

Donald Trump in her tell-all book about the 2016 presiden-tial race, but she also blames Barack Obama, Bernie Sanders, Vladimir Putin and others, pub-lished excerpts show.

In her campaign chronicle “What Happened,” set for release on September 12, the veteran Democrat acknowl-edges her own role in her defeat, writing: “It was my campaign. Those were my decisions.” But she also points the finger at a long list of political rivals, apparent allies, and morning tel-evision hosts, and signals that much of what happened in 2016 was outside her control.

Sanders, a socialist-leaning senator who challenged her dur-ing the Democratic primaries, resorted to “innuendo and impugning on my character” in attacks that caused “lasting dam-age” and disunity, the 69-year-old Clinton wrote, according to excerpts reported by US media on Thursday and Friday.

Regardless of how “progres-sive” her own policy proposals

were, “Bernie would come out with something even bigger, loftier and leftier, regardless of whether it was realistic or not,” she added.

Sanders offered a terse response. “I.e., Bernie Sanders just stole all of Hillary Clinton’s ideas. Does anybody really believe that?” he said on MSNBC.

Clinton also trained her frustrations on Obama, who backed her as his successor, say-ing a stronger, televised response by the then-president to Russian meddling in the elec-tion might have helped her.

“Maybe more Americans would have woken up to the threat in time. We’ll never know,” she said according to CNN, which obtained a copy of the book.

Clinton also criticized former vice president Joe Biden, who cam-paigned with her, and former FBI director James Comey.

She blamed a frustrated elec-torate for falling for Trump instead of embracing her more traditional campaign, writing that the billionaire businessman ran “a reality TV show that expertly and relentlessly stoked Ameri-cans’ anger and resentment.”

Women voters apparently were also partly to blame.

Clinton wrote that while she was impressed with the massive anti-Trump demonstrations in the days after his January inau-guration, “I couldn’t help but ask where those feelings of solidar-ity, outrage and passion had been during the election.”

Putin—and Russia’s appar-ent meddling in the 2016 election—also took hits, with Clinton accusing the Russian president of holding a “personal vendetta” against her, accord-ing to Vanity Fair.

Perhaps in a page out of Trump’s own playbook, Clinton took a shot at the media as well, in particular the NBC ‘Today’ host Matt Lauer. Clinton has scheduled a 15-city tour pro-moting her book, beginning in Washington on September 18.

Hillary Clinton plays blame game in new book

US Senate panel okays funding for UN climate body

US appeals court rejects Trump’s bid to bar most refugees

Rescue efforts on

The 8.1 magnitude quake off the southern coast late on Thursday was stronger than a devastating 1985 temblor that flattened swathes of Mexico City and killed thousands.

Rescue workers laboured through the night in badly affected areas to look for people who were possibly trapped in collapsed buildings.

BUSINESSBUSINESS$47.76 $47.76

-1.33-1.33

BRENT

French President Emmanuel Macron (left) and Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras (second left) arrive for a roundtable discussion with French and Greek business leaders yesterday in Athens, as part of a two-day official visit of the French president to Greece.

French-Greek business leaders’ meet

PAGE | 12PAGE | 12

BoE fear factor and data bounce help sterling

Uber to stop using diesel cars

in London Dow & Brent before going to press

Saturday 9 September 2017

21,813.16+28.33 PTS

0.13%DOW

UK’s economy shows little sign of lifting lethargy

London

Reuters

Britain’s Brexit-bound economy is showing little sign that its leaden performance in the first half of

2017 is improving much, despite hints of better times for manu-facturers in data released yesterday.

Factory output increased at the fastest pace this year dur-ing July, but this was set against a sharp decline in the construc-tion industry and another lacklustre month for trade.

The official figures sug-gested the world’s fifth-biggest economy continued to lag the strong recovery in the euro zone and is now growing slowly in the third quarter after suf-fering its slowest first half of the year since 2012.

Separately on Friday, the British Chambers of Commerce said the economy was “tread-ing water” ahead of Brexit, adding that the pound’s sharp fall since last year’s vote to

leave the European Union had done more harm than good.

That muted assessment was backed up by the official data which showed little help for exporters from sterling’s weakness.

“The economy is clearly underperforming compared to what is going on globally and regionally, but weakness in growth does not appear to be intensifying,” JPMorgan econ-omist Malcolm Barr said.

The Office for National Sta-tistics said manufacturing output rose 0.5 percent in July, above economists’ forecasts in a Reuters poll, after car produc-tion reversed a dip in theprevious month.

But growth in the broader measure of industrial output slowed to 0.2 percent, in line with forecasts as a lack of sum-mer maintenance of North Sea oil fields boosted production more than usual for the time of year.

The data suggested that the Bank of England, which holds its next monetary policy meet-ing next week, will remain cautious about raising interest rates despite an inflation rate heading for 3 percent, above its 2 percent target.

Business surveys over the last week suggested manufac-turers look set for a stronger end to the year, boosted by exports -especially to the Euro-pean Union. Still, official data have yet to reflect this. The ONS said Britain’s trade deficit in goods edged up to £11.576bn ($15.24bn) in July, the biggest since March.

LNG glut may flip to deficit as Cheniere sees China growthLondon/New York Bloomberg

The global glut plaguing liq-uefied natural gas markets may start to dwindle in five

years, threatening to spur a huge deficit.

New projects are needed to fill the shortfall, with demand for the super-chilled fuel forecast to double in the 20 years to 2035, Cedigaz, a Paris-based industry research group, said in its LNG Outlook. Buyers in Asia are boosting use of the fuel at a “staggering” pace, Jack Fusco (pictured), chief executive officer

of US exporter Cheniere Energy Inc., said in a Bloomberg Televi-sion interview.

While plants currently in

operation or being built will add to global oversupply, aging facil-ities and shrinking resources in some areas mean capacity will start declining after 2021. That’s a boon for companies from Royal Dutch Shell Plc to Tellurian Inc. and Novatek PJSC looking to invest in new production in the next decade to meet demand.

“The continuous growth of the LNG market will leave a large margin for the implementation of new projects,” Cedigaz said in the report emailed Thursday.

The US shale boom will make the country the biggest LNG pro-ducer by the end of the period,

according to the Cedigaz report. Output will end in some nations such as Trinidad and Tobago.

“I foresee that the LNG mar-ket needs at least a hundred million tons of new liquefaction capacity above what’s under construction today in order to meet demand needs of the mar-ket by 2025,” Meg Gentle, chief executive officer at Tellurian, said by phone Thursday. “Demand is growing more than people expected.”

Global LNG capacity is expected to peak at 387 million tons a year by 2021-2022 from 288 million tons this year at

existing or under-construction plants, Cedigaz said. Trinidad and Tobago, the world’s ninth-biggest producer, will stop production in 2029. The Atlan-tic LNG venture in the Caribbean nation has already curbed out-put and cut its workforce due to feed-gas shortages.

Algeria, Indonesia, Malaysia and even Australia, which next year will add more capacity than any other nation, will see declines in output by the end of the next decade. By 2035, new LNG projects will be required in all regions, with additional capacity needs estimated at 154

million tons, according to the report. Qatar produces 77 mil-lion tons a year.

While the oversupply lingers, increases in Australian and US capacity will shake up the list of the biggest producers. The out-look is based on stable production at Qatar, though the nation’s decision to boost output by 30 percent to 2024 “could change the game,” Cedigaz said.

LNG imports are set to increase to 503 million tons by 2035 from 243 million tons in 2015, according to the report. Asia will remain the biggest LNG import region.

ECB agrees on stimulus cut at policy meetingFrankfurt

Reuters

European Central Bank policymakers meeting on Thursday were in

broad agreement their next step would be to cut bond purchases, with four options under consideration, two sources with direct knowl-edge of the discussion said.

Possibilities discussed by the ECB included - but are not limited to - cutting monthly assets buys from €60bn now to €40bn a month or €20bn from the start of next year, with extension options including 6 months or 9 months, said the sources, who asked not to be named.

Any decision, likely come in October, should also be backed by a broad consen-sus, the sources said, with one suggesting a compromise could be found for setting monthly purchases some-where between €20bn and €40bn.

This showed that policy-makers are keen to avoid the repeat of the public discord that has marred the history of the quantitative easing pro-gram since its 2015 launch, with decisions criticized by national central banks hostile to the policy and even by some within the ECB’s own Executive Board.

Indeed, Germany’s cen-tral bank governor Jens Weidmann, who has long called for the ECB to step off the QE pedal, struck a concil-iatory tone yesterday.

“The increase in inflation is sluggish and the uncertainty about the future inflation path is quite large,” Weidmann, who sits on the ECB’s Govern-ing Council, said.

Turkish wealth fund to be reorganised: ErdoganAnkara

Reuters

President Tayyip Erdogan said yesterday. Turkey would reorganise its $40

bn sovereign wealth fund after dismissing the organisation’s chairman over its failure to meet targets since it was founded a year ago,

Mehmet Bostan was removed as chairman of the fund as of Thursday and the head of the Borsa Istanbul stock exchange, Himmet Karadag, was named as acting chairman, a senior official earlier told Reuters.

“The desired goals and progress were not achieved in the wealth fund,” Erdogan told reporters ahead of a foreign trip.

“We need to reorganise the wealth fund and we will take that step after the Kazakhstan visit.”

The president said he dis-cussed the issue with Prime Minister Binali Yildirim, who is responsible for the fund, and they “decided it could not go on this way”.

Reuters was not immedi-ately able to reach Bostan or Karadag for comment.

The fund was set up last year by the government to develop and increase the value of Tur-key’s strategic assets and provide resources for invest-ment. Historically, sovereign wealth funds have been set up with oil producers such as Nor-way or Gulf states, using money from energy exports for

investment. But Turkey imports almost all of its energy and some economists have said the gov-ernment could better spend money paying down a national debt that runs at roughly 30 per-cent of economic output.

The government has trans-ferred stakes worth billions of dollars of state assets, including stakes in flag carrier Turkish Air-lines, major banks and fixed-line operator Turk Telekom.

The government has said it wanted the fund to manage $200bn in assets as soon as pos-sible. One senior official toldReuters this year that the fund could be used to secure financing for major infrastruc-ture projects. Ratings agency S&P has said the fund was more akin to a national development bank,

Rate hike

The official figures suggested the world’s fifth-biggest economy continued to lag the recovery in the euro zone.

The data suggested that the Bank of England will remain cautious about raising interest rates.

8,675.46 -9.09 PTS

0.10%

QE

7,377.60 -19.38 PTS

0.26%

FTSE100

Queen Maxima, the UN Secretary-General’s Special Advocate for Inclusive Finance for Development, speaks with Mexico’s President Enrique Pena Nieto during the opening ceremony of the Third International Forum for Financial Inclusion at the National Palace in Mexico City, Mexico.

International Forum for Financial Inclusion

12 SATURDAY 9 SEPTEMBER 2017 BUSINESS

E-cars to shine at Frankfurt show as diesel takes backseatFrankfurt am Main AFP

Hundreds of thou-sands of car enthusiasts are set to flock to Frank-furt’s IAA motor

show next week where auto giants hope to show off their electric prowess as scandal-plagued diesels take a backseat.

Two years after “dieselgate” crashed the last IAA party, when Volkswagen’s public admission that it had cheated on diesel emissions tests embarrassingly coincided with the fair, organis-ers are hoping to turn the page by focusing on the cleaner cars of the future.

But as more automakers have come under suspicion and concern about diesel pollution has grown, industry expert Ste-fan Bratzel expects the mood at this year’s 10-day extravaganza to be “mixed”.

“On the one hand, the auto industry is enjoying its best years ever in terms of sales and prof-its, but on the other it’s wondering what’s going to hap-pen in future,” said Bratzel of Germany’s Center for Automo-tive Management.

“Diesel and its harmful emis-sions are a topic of hot debate right now, especially in Germany, creating an image problem for the entire industry.”

German Chancellor Angela Merkel, eyeing a fourth term in a September 24 general election, will on Thursday formally open the 67th International Motor Show.

While Merkel has said she had been “angered” by the cheat-ing scam, she has also been careful not to demonise a sector that is the backbone of the Ger-man economy and employs more than 800,000 people.

“Diesel, and the internal combustion engine, will exist for many, many years to come,” she

said in a recent interview. But other countries aren’t so sure. Both France and Britain have announced plans to ban the sale of new diesel and petrol cars by 2040 to clamp down on harm-ful emissions.

“All this uncertainty surround-ing diesel and gasoline engines will hang over the trade show,” pre-dicted Flavien Neuvy, auto expert at France’s Observatoire Cetelem.

Automakers around the world are responding to the challenges by dramatically shifting focus to elec-tric and automated vehicles, belatedly joining a race started by Silicon Valley giant Tesla to take zero-emission cars into the

mainstream. In the run-up to the IAA, which alternates each year with the Paris Motor Show, Ger-man luxury carmaker BMW and Britain’s Jaguar Land Rover became the latest manufacturers to promise electric or hybrid

models across all their brands in coming years.

Despite all the buzz, the year’s most-talked about car will be conspicuously absent from the Frankfurt convention centre: Tesla’s Model 3.

Hedge fund momentum trade hits bumps as energy ralliesNew York Bloomberg

Momentum traders beware: the stocks you least want to see rally-

ing are suddenly doing just that.Energy shares, whose 17 per-

cent decline from January through August was the worst return in the S&P 500, just climbed six straight days for the longest streak in a year. Retail-ers, at risk of their biggest annual loss since the financial crisis, have advanced on all but three days since bottoming about three weeks ago.

One result is that a Dow Jones Index that shorts the low-est momentum stocks and buys the highest fell four days in a row through Thursday. Hardly the

end of the world, but perhaps a trend worth noticing.

“We can’t endorse groups like retail or energy structurally, we do want to respect recent price action,” Chris Verrone, head of technical analysis at Strategas Research in New York, wrote in a note Thursday. “There are some turns playing out.”

Surging laggards are threat-ening to upend a hugely successful trade that has drawn investors to market leaders such as technology. While momen-tum chasing delivered gains double the S&P 500’s this year, lately it’s stumbled as losing stocks suddenly jumped. Right now in September, 2017’s worst performers are beating the best by 2 percentage points.

Not that the tide has turned

for their businesses. Retailers are still up against Amazon.com Inc. and oil still won’t climb above $50 a barrel. Rather, the reversal is part bounce from extreme depths, part calendar quirk in which October and November have historically been the month when losers rally.

The biggest losers have out-performed the biggest winners by at least 1.2 percentage points each month, according to data compiled by Strategas Research Partners LLC that goes back to 1990.

Theoretically, the rotation broadens stock participation, helping ease investor concern that a rush into popular names such as Facebook Inc., Apple Inc. and Amazon leaves the market too dependent on a few stocks.

While the S&P 500 is within 1 percent of its all-time high reached on Aug. 7, fewer than one-tenth of its members have made 52-week highs in each trading session over the past month.

The bad news, however, is that investors may not be posi-tioned for that shift yet. Take energy, for instance. Mutual fund managers reduced their holdings for five consecutive months through July, with their exposure reaching the lowest in a year, according to data compiled by Bank of America Corp.

At the same time, they held a record overweight in technology.

A reversal in market leader-ship, if it lasts, may cast a shadow on what’s been the best year for

money managers since the bull market began. Thanks to the boost from tech stocks, more than half of the large-cap mutual funds have beat their benchmark indexes during the first eight months of 2017, the highest hit rate since 2009, Bank of Amer-ica’s data showed.

The stress from losers win-ning may also show up on hedge funds’ short books. For most of the year, bears have raised wagers against energy and retailer stocks, a trade that has paid off with their shares tumbling.

Now these bets may be back-firing. A Goldman Sachs Group Inc. basket of most-shorted stocks was up in 10 of the past 12 days, advancing 6.5 percent over the stretch.

BoE fear factor and data bounce help sterlingLondon

Reuters

Stronger-than-expected manufacturing data helped Britain’s pound rise

towards $1.32 and hold its ground against a broadly stronger euro yestereday as a wave of selling in the past month ran out of steam.

Overall industrial output was in line with forecasts for a small 0.4 percent expansion on the year in July but manufac-turing, bolstered by a weaker pound, did far better, expand-ing 1.9 percent compared to a forecast 1.7 percent.

Neither number is likely to settle the unease that saw spec-ulators double net bets against sterling in the past three weeks.

But traders say the weak-ness of the dollar and the possibility of a sign next week from the Bank of England that it is worried about the weak pound’s effect on inflation have stalled the build-up of bets against the currency.

“We had the forecast beat on the industrial data this morning, but the big driver is really the weakness of the dol-lar,” said Sam Lynton-Brown, a strategist with BNP Paribas in London.

“The resistance (to more euro gains) comes from the Bank of England’s FX sensitiv-ity. They have said several times they are not indifferent, and sterling is approaching the October lows.”

A number of major banks have argued this week there is room for a pause in sales of the

pound, but the emergence of several forecasts for a fall to parity with the euro underlines the risks to sterling from the Brexit process over the next few months.

The euro’s strength after Thursday’s European Central Bank meeting also raised the prospect of more pressure.

“With the ECB seemingly gearing up to reduce its Asset Purchase Programme once again, the risk remains of a fresh rally for the euro into ter-ritory (against the pound) it has rarely traded in before,” said Simon Derrick (pictured), chief market analyst with Bank of New York Mellon in London.

“The pound faces a number of potential stumbling blocks in the weeks ahead,” he said, pointing to parliament’s vote on the government’s umbrella EU repeal bill next week.

By 1008 GMT, sterling was 0.1 percent higher against the euro on the day at 91.70 pence. It gained just under a half a percent to $1.3161.

China’s yuan leads EM gainsLondon

Reuters

China’s yuan was the star performer among developing market cur-

rencies yesterday, heading for its best week since revalua-tion in 2005, while a bruised dollar sent emerging stocks to new three-year highs.

The Chinese currency has risen more than 7.5 percent against the dollar this year, helped by signs the world’s second-largest economy is still expanding at a healthy pace.

It was up 0.4 percent on yesterday to 6.45 versus the dollar, its highest since March 2016, after data showing stronger-than-expected import growth in August rein-forced optimism.

“A year ago people were worried about how long Chi-na’s hard currency reserves would last as they were burn-ing through them to try and support the currency. And now we have had FX reserves rising for a few months,” said Julian Evans-Pritchard, China economist at Capital Economics.

“The scope that the yuan can appreciate is limited by how willing the PBOC is to let it appreciate,” Evans-Pritch-ard said, predicting the yuan would be at 6.4 to the dollar at the end of next year and 6.2 at the end of 2019.

Broad dollar weakness helped emerging assets after European Central Bank Presi-dent Mario Draghi suggested the central bank may begin tapering its massive stimulus programme this autumn.

MSCI’s benchmark index of emerging stocks was up 0.3 percent yesterday after touch-ing its highest since 2014 earlier in the day.

It was on course for its eighth week of gains in nine. There were strong gains in Russian shares and on the Hong Kong bourse yesterday, but stock markets in South Africa and Turkey slipped.

The Russian rouble fell around 0.3 percent versus the dollar, pricing in expectations that the central bank will cut interest rates by as much as 50 basis points next week follow-ing a sharp slowdown in inflation. Currencies like the rouble, Turkey’s lira and South Africa’s rand are all up over 0.5 percent against the dollar this week, following falls in the greenback.

Electric cars seen charging up at a power station in Denmark in this file picture.

Uber to stop using diesel cars in London London

Reuters

Uber will cease using die-sel cars in London by the end of 2019 and the vast

majority of rides will be in elec-tric or hybrid vehicles by then, the taxi app said yesterday.

At the moment the company says around half of all the jour-ney miles completed in the British capital are undertaken with greener vehicles on the firm’s standard low-cost UberX service, which lets customers book jour-neys on their smartphone.

Several carmakers have announced plans in recent months to electrify a large

proportion of their new cars, with Volvo becoming the first major carmaker to set a date for phas-ing out vehicles powered solely by the internal combustion engine.

Britain will ban the sale of new petrol and diesel cars from 2040, replicating plans by France and cities such as Madrid, Mex-ico City and Athens.

Uber, which has about 40,000 London drivers, will only offer electric or hybrid models on UberX by the turn of the decade and plans to do the same by 2022 nationwide.

“Air pollution is a growing problem and we’re determined to play our part in tackling it with

this bold plan,” said Uber’s Head of UK Cities, Fred Jones.

“Londoners already know many cars on our app are hybrids, but we want to go much further and go all electric in the capital,” he said.

Globally, Uber has endured a tumultuous few months after a string of scandals involving alle-gations of sexism and bullying at the company, leading to investor pressure which forced out CEO and co-founder Travis Kalanick.

In London, the firm has faced criticism from unions, lawmak-ers and traditional black cab drivers over working conditions.

Merkel to open

German Chancellor Angela Merkel will on Thursday formally open the 67th International Motor Show.

Diesel and its harmful emissions are a topic of hot debate, especially in Germany.

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Yesterday’s answer

BABY

BLU

ES

ALL IN THE MIND

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15:00 Europe's Forbidden

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17:30 Women Make Change

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22:30 The Listening Post

23:00 Al Jazeera World

09:25 How Do They Do

It?

09:40 Last Chance

Hospital

11:20 X-Ray Mega Airport

13:30 The Island With

Bear Grylls

15:00 Cooper's Treasure:

The Hunt For A

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15:40 The Island With

Bear Grylls

16:35 Treasure Quest:

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17:25 Legend Of Croc

Gold

18:20 X-Ray Mega

Airport

19:15 Deadliest Catch

20:10 Last Chance

Hospital

21:50 Edge Of Alaska

22:40 Idris Elba: Fighter

23:30 Cooper's Treasure:

The Hunt For A

Secret Fortune

07:00 Swamp Brothers

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08:15 Untamed &

Uncut

12:50 Project Grizzly

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Close

Encounters

17:25 Gator Boys

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21:05 Wild Iberia

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Uncut

01:40 Gator Boys

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Middle

22:00 Bunk'd

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Of Ladybug And

Cat Noir

22:50 Lolirock

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Of A Teenage

Witch

23:35 Binny And The

Ghost

Conceptis Sudoku: Conceptis Sudoku is a number-

placing puzzle based on a 9×9 grid. The object is to

place the numbers 1 to 9 in the empty squares so

that each row, each column and each 3×3 box

contains the same number only once.

CROSSWORD

CONCEPTIS SUDOKU

Yesterday's answer

MALL

LANDMARK

ROYAL PLAZA

ASIAN TOWN

NOVO — Pearl

ROXY

American Made (2D/Action) 10:00am, 12:20, 2:40, 5:00, 7:20, 9:40pm&12:00midnight IT (2D/Horror) 10:10am, 12:00noon, 12:50, 3:00, 3:30, 6:00, 6:10, 8:50, 9:00, 11:30pm & 12:00midnightAl Khalya (2D/Action) 10:00am, 12:10, 3:15, 4:50, 8:30 & 9:30pmTerminator 2 (2D/Action) 12:30, 5:45 & 11:00pm Car Go (2D/Animation) 10:00am, 12:00noon, 2:00, 4:00 & 6:00pm London Heist (2D/Action) 8:00, 10:00pm & 12:00midnight Nut Job 2: Nutty By Nature (2D/Animation) 10:00am, 12:00noon, 2:00, 4:00 & 6:00pm Wish Upon (2D/Thriller) 8:00, 10:00pm & 12:00midnightAnnabelle 2 (2D/Horror) 10:00am, 2:40, 7:20pm & 12:00midnight The Glass Castle (2D/Drama) 11:30am, 2:00, 4:30, 7:00, 9:30pm & 12:00midnight The Hitman's Bodyguard (2D/Comedy) 10:00am, 12:20, 2:40, 5:00, 7:20, 9:40pm & 12:00midnight IT (2D IMAX/Horror) 10:00am, 12:45, 3:30, 6:15, 9:00 & 11:45pm

Velipadinte Pushtakam (2D/Malayalam) 2:00 & 11:30pm Punjab Nahi Jaungi (2D) 4:00 & 9:00pm Poster Boys (Hindi) 4:45pm The Glass Castle (2D/Drama) 7:00pm IT (2D/Horror) 7:30, 9:15 & 11:30pm Daddy (2D/Hindi) 2:00 & 6:45pm Car Go (2D/Animation) 4:15pm Nut Job 2: Nutty By Nature (2D/Animation) 2:30 & 6:00pm London Heist (2D/Action) 9:45pm Neruppuda (2D/Tamil) 11:45pm

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Car Go (2D/Animation) 2:00 & 3:45pm

The Glass Castle (2D/Drama) 4:45pm The Nut Job 2: Nutty By Nature (2D/Animation) 5:30pm London Heist (2D/Action) 7:00pmIT (2D/Horror) 7:00, 9:15 & 11:45pm Al Khalya (2D/Arabic) 9:00pmVelipadinte Pushtakam (2D/Malayalam) 11:30pm

Velipadinte Pushtakam 12:00noon, 12:30, 2:45, 3:15, 3:45, 5:30, 6:00, 8:15, 8:45, 11:00, 11:30pm Neruppuda (Tamil) 12:15 & 9:00pm Baadshaho (Hindi) 1:00pm Kathanayagan 2:45 & 11:30pm Daddy 6:30pm

The Nut Job 2 (Animation) 4:00 & 6:00pm Terminator 2 (Action) 8:00 & 10:50pm

Car Go (2D/Animation) 12:00noon & 2:00pm Yudham Sharanam 2:30, 5:30 & 8:30pm

Pushtakam (2D/Malayalam) 12:00noon, 3:10, 6:20, 9:30pm & 12:40am American Made (2D/Action) 12:00noon & 11:30pmIT (2D/Horror) 12:00noon, 2:45, 5:30, 8:15 & 11:00pm

AL KHORThe Nut Job 2 (Animation) 11:30am & 1:30pm

Emoji 10:30am & 2:30pm Despicable Me 3 11:30am & 3:00pm

Captain Underpants 12:30 & 4:30pm Daddy 9:15 & 12:00midnight

IT 3:30 & 6:15pm Neruppuda (Tamil) 6:30pm Kathanayagan 8:30 & 11:15pm Terminator 2 (Action) 3:30 & 6:00pm Velipadinte Pushtakam 9:00 & 12:00am

Yesterday's answer

SPORT16 SATURDAY 9 SEPTEMBER 2017

Dovizioso aims for home comforts to extend lead Misano Adriatico, Italy

AFP

New MotoGP champion-ship leader Andrea Dovizioso heads into this weekend’s San Marino Grand Prix with

a slender nine-point advantage to defend over reigning world cham-pion Marc Marquez.

The Italian, who overtook Mar-quez at the top of the riders’ standings last time out with victory at Silverstone, is a native of Forlim-popoli, a town just 65km from the Misano circuit in Rimini.

The Ducati man will be looking to make good use of home comforts, especially with his legendary com-patriot Valentino Rossi missing after breaking his leg in training.

“Coming to Misano as leader of the championship is fantastic, even though I’m really sorry that Rossi will not be there, as it would have been great to also battle against him,” Dovizioso said.

“In the past the Misano circuit hasn’t been too favourable for Ducati, but a couple of weeks back we did a very positive test at this cir-cuit and we are on good form, so we’ll be trying to take home the best possible result.”

The 31-year-old was losing ground in the title race a month ago, when he was 21 points adrift of Mar-quez after the Spaniard’s back-to-back wins in Germany and the Czech Republic.

But Dovizioso has hit back with successive victories of his own, although has five riders within 35 points of him in a close championship.

Rossi, 38, now looks unlikely though to claim a record 10th world title this year after his injury, and Maverick Vinales will be Yamaha’s sole rider tomorrow in his absence.

“It’s a big pity that I can’t be at my home GP,” Rossi lamented.

“For sure, I was really looking forward to the round in Misano,

because riding in front of the fans there is something very special, but I have to treat the injury with care.”

Marquez has won four times in total at this race, which is called the San Marino Grand Prix because of its proximity to the country and the fact that there is already an Italian race at Mugello.

But only one of those Marquez wins has come in the top class, and the Honda rider knows he needs to

find his best form after being forced to quit in Britain with engine failure.

“We’ll try and have a great week-end in Misano, putting the last race behind us,” said the three-time MotoGP world champion.

“The important thing is that lately we’ve been competitive at all kinds of tracks, so now we go to Mis-ano, which has a twisty, tight layout, with the same approach and

mentality that have worked very well for us so far.”

Marquez’s Honda teammate Dani Pedrosa won in Misano last year and sits fifth in the standings, although he hasn’t won since edg-ing out Marquez on home soil at Jerez de la Frontera back in May.

“I’m looking forward to the Mis-ano race and it’s a track I like,” he said.

“I have good memories there and I’ve enjoyed some strong results, so I hope to be able to work well in every session.”

The 22-year-old Vinales still has championship hopes of his own and is only 13 points behind Dovizioso and four adrift of second-placed Marquez, thanks largely to his two straight wins right at the start of the campaign.

“I’m starting to have the same feeling on my M1 that I had at the beginning of the season and that gives me a lot of calm and allows me to focus on continuing to get points in each race,” he said.

Moto21. Franco Morbidelli (ITA/Kalex) 223, 2. Thomas Luthi (SUI/Kalex) 194, 3. Alex Marquez (ESP/

Kalex) 155, 4. Miguel Oliveira (POR/KTM) 141, 5. Francesco Bagnaia (ITA/Kalex) 111, 6. Mattia

Pasini (ITA/Kalex) 104, 7. Takaaki Nakagami (JPN/Kalex) 104, 8. Simone Corsi (ITA/Speed Up)

78, 9. Dominique Agerter (SUI/Suter) 63, 10. Luca Marini (ITA/Kalex) 59

Motorcycling: World championship standings MotoGP1. Andrea Dovizioso (ITA/Ducati) 183 points, 2. Marc Marquez (ESP/Honda) 174, 3. Maverick

Vinales (ESP/Yamaha) 170, 4. Valentino Rossi (ITA/Yamaha) 157, 5. Dani Pedrosa (ESP/Honda)

148, 6. Johann Zarco (FRA/Yamaha Tech3) 109, 7. Jorge Lorenzo (ESP/Ducati) 90, 8. Cal

Crutchlow (GBR/LCR Honda) 89, 9. Jonas Folger (GER/ Yahama Tech3) 77, 10. Danilo Petrucci

(ITA/Ducati Pramac) 75

Ducati Team’s Italian rider

Andrea Dovizioso rides his bike out of his pit during the first practice

session at the Marco Simoncelli

Circuit of the San Marino Moto

GP Grand Prix race in Misano

yesterday.

Chiefs upset Patriots in NFL season opener Boston

AFP

Rookie running back Kareem Hunt upstaged Tom Brady as the Kansas City Chiefs

launched the new National Football League season with a stunning 42-27 upset of the New England Patriots on Thursday.

Chiefs quarterback Alex Smith threw for 368 yards and four touch-downs to puncture the festive atmosphere as the Super Bowl champion Patriots raised their championship banner in the tradi-tional season kick-off at Gillette Stadium.

But it was 22-year-old Hunt who stole the show for the Chiefs, recov-ering from a fumble on his first possession to finish a debut to remember with three touchdowns.

“We just stuck together,” Hunt said. “We’re like the underdogs, a lot of peo-ple didn’t believe in us. We just wanted to come out and shock the world.”

Smith meanwhile produced a virtuoso display at quarterback for the Chiefs, completing 28 of 35 pass attempts with no interceptions.

Brady had a frustrating night, throwing for 267 yards and no touch-downs. The 40-year-old five-time Super Bowl champion completed only 16 of 36 attempts.

“It’s a terrible feeling,” a stony-faced Brady said after the defeat. “But the only guys that can do some-thing about it are back in that locker room. We’ve got to dig a lot deeper

than we did tonight. Because we didn’t dig very deep tonight.”

Patriots coach Bill Belichick was typically blunt in his assessment of the loss.

“We didn’t really do much of anything well enough to deserve a win,” Belichick said. “We gave up 42 points. Gotta coach better, gotta practice better, gotta play better.

Patriots fans had launched the evening in Foxborough in raucous mood, raining boos down on NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell at the opening ceremonies.

Brady was quickly into his groove, leading a nine-play, 73-yard drive that culminated with Mike Gil-lislee’s two-yard touchdown run.

The Pats looked to have grabbed another touchdown after recover-ing a Chiefs fumble, only for Rob Gronkowski’s end zone reception to be deemed incomplete after a video review.

Instead it was the Chiefs who recovered, getting on the board when Demetrius Harris gathered Smith’s seven-yard pass after a 90-yard drive.

A Stephen Gostkowski field goal and a second Gillislee touchdown saw the Patriots go 17-7 up but Hunt’s first touchdown of the night from a three-yard Smith pass pulled the Chiefs back to 17-14.

A superb 75-yard touchdown pass from Smith to Tyreek Hill then

put the Chiefs 21-17 ahead only for Gillislee to barrel over from one yard to put the Patriots 24-21 ahead with 5:01 remaining in the third quarter.

A further Gostkowski field goal stretched the Patriots lead to 27-21 but Kansas City hit back almost immediately with a brilliant 78-yard touchdown from Smith to Hunt to put the Chiefs ahead.

The Chiefs stopped the Patriots on a crucial fourth and inches early in the fourth quarter, and Hunt then dived over in the corner for his third touchdown of the night to make it 35-27.

Charcandrick West then added another touchdown to complete the scoring for the Chiefs.

AP

The Cleveland Indians set a franchise record with their 15th consecutive win on Thursday night, beating the Chicago White Sox 11-2

behind another terrific outing for Corey Kluber.Cleveland also belted five homers while becom-

ing the first major league team with a 15-game winning streak since Oakland won 20 in a row in 2002. Edwin Encarnacion hit a three-run drive in the first, Francisco Lindor connected in the sec-ond, Erik Gonzalez went deep twice and Greg Allen hit his first major league homer in the seventh.

Kluber (15-4) struck out 13 in seven innings. Yolmer Sanchez and Jose Abreu homered in the first for Chicago, but Kluber allowed only one more hit — a fifth-inning single for Omar Narvaez.

The last-place White Sox turned to Mike Pel-frey after left-hander Carlos Rodon was scratched with shoulder stiffness. Pelfrey (3-11), who threw 40 pitches in 2 1/3 relief innings on Tuesday night, allowed seven runs and eight hits in four innings.

Elsewhere, the Twins’ Jorge Polanco drove in the go-ahead runs off ailing Kansas City closer Kel-vin Herrera with two outs in the ninth inning.

Herrera (3-3), who has been dealing with a mild forearm strain, inherited a 2-1 lead before giving up a pair of singles and a walk. Brian Dozier hit a tying sacrifice fly, and after Joe Mauer was walked intentionally, Polanco lined a single up the middle for the lead.

Trevor Hildenberger (3-2) earned the win with a scoreless eighth.

Boom wins time trial to lead Tour of Britain Reuters

Dutchman Lars Boom took the lead of the Tour of Britain after winning a short indi-vidual time trial on Thursday.

Boom, overall winner in 2011, was six seconds quicker than Lotto NL-Jumbo team mate Victor Campenaerts over the 16km layout on the Essex coast, averaging 51kph.

Boom now leads overall by eight seconds from Campenaerts with Team Sky’s Vasil Kiryienka third.

Twelve riders lie within 30-seconds of the race lead, including Team Sky’s Welsh duo Geraint Tho-mas and Owain Doull.

Schurter looks to seal dominance in elite class at worlds AFP

Switzerland’s defending world champion Nino Schurter will be bidding to extend his record-breaking winning run in the men’s elite event

at the world mountain bike championships in Aus-tralia today.

Schurter, the reigning Olympic champion, has won all six events in the World Cup this season and is after the world title to complete his domination.

The Swiss will be challenged in Cairns in north-ern Australia by two former world and Olympic champions Julien Absalon of France and the Czech Republic’s Jaroslav Kulhavy.

Schurter’s winning streak at the World Cup began in May at Nove Mesto and continued in Alb-stadt and Vallnord.

The closest match to Schurter this season was at the fourth round in Lenzerheide, when Kulhavy chased back from a bad start to come within three seconds of the Swiss at the finish line.

“I’m stoked I’ve achieved this 6/6 strike but it takes a good portion of luck and a reliable team and equipment to conquer,” Schurter said.

Schurter has already had success at the world championships, helping Switzerland end France’s dominance in the cross country team relay.

Schurter anchored the Swiss team to victory 24 seconds ahead of Denmark and France.

France had won the past three relays before the format changed to five riders for 2017.

Indians set club record with 15th straight win

C olorado 9 LA Dodgers 1

San Diego 3 St. Louis 0

Minnesota 4 Kansas City 2

Cleveland 11 Chicago White Sox 2

Atlanta 6 Miami 5

NY Mets 7 Cincinnati 2

Chicago Cubs 8 Pittsburgh 2

Washington 4 Philadelphia 3

NY Yankees 9 Baltimore 1

BASEBALL RESULTS

Kansas City Chiefs running back Kareem Hunt prepares to touchdown in front of New England Patriots strong safety Jordan Richards and cornerback Malcolm Butler (right) at Gillette Stadium on Thursday.

17SATURDAY 9 SEPTEMBER 2017 SPORT

England press for series winLondon

AFP

Hosts England pushed for a series-clinch-ing win against the West Indies at Lord’s yesterday.

In a three-match contest all square at 1-1, West Indies ended the second day of the third Test on 93 for three in their second innings -- a lead of just 22 runs.

Shai Hope, West Indies’ bat-ting star this series, was 35 not out and Roston Chase three not out.

After Ben Stokes (60) and Stuart Broad (38) had given Eng-land a valuable first-innings lead of 71, it was James Anderson who f i t t i n g l y m a d e t h e breakthrough.

Starting West Indies’ second innings on 499 Test wickets, it took the 35-year-old just 12 deliveries to become only the sixth bowler and third paceman with 500 when he bowled Kraigg Brathwaite for four with a superb inswinger.

West Indies were now six for one and that became 21 for two when Kyle Hope, Shai’s older brother, saw his miserable series end when he was lbw to Broad for one. Stokes was on a hat-trick after taking two wickets in two balls at the end of the tour-ists first innings.

Kieran Powell, dropped on two, denied him that prize.

But there was nothing Pow-ell, who made a fine 45, could do when Anderson, from around the wicket, produced an unplay-able delivery that speared in

towards the left-hander’s stumps only move away late off a full length and clip the off bail.

West Indies were now 69 for three -- still two runs behind and with plenty of overs left in an extended third session under the floodlights after rain earlier in the day. Shai Hope, whose twin hundreds -- his first in Test cricket -- had done so much to secure a series-levelling win at Headingley -- again showed his class when he cover-drove Stokes for four.

Women’s coach Marijne to take charge of India men’s teamNew Delhi

AFP

India yesteray put women’s field hockey coach Sjoerd Marijne in charge of the

men’s team following the sacking of fellow Dutchman Roelant Oltmans.

India’s new Sports Minis-ter Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore, an Olympic medal-ist , announced the appointment on Twitter.

“Current chief coach of Indian senior women hockey team, Mr. Waltherus (Sjoerd) Marijne, will take over as chief coach of Indian senior men hockey team,” Rathore wrote.

Hockey India sacked Olt-mans on Saturday after a poor European tour. It placed an advertisement this week, which was quickly taken down.

The 43-year-old Marijne is expected to start this month after returning from a tour of Europe with the women’s team.

“I’m excited to take the new role and thank Hockey India for showing their con-fidence in my abilities,” Marijne was quoted as saying in a statement by the hockey federation.

In February, Marijne and Eric Wonink were named as chief coach and analytical coach of the women’s team until the 2020 Tokyo Olym-pics. But now India’s Harendra Singh takes over as the chief coach of the wom-en’s team.

Oltmans, who joined as performance director in 2013, was sacked after two years as coach because of a string of poor performances.

India finished sixth in the Hockey World League semi-finals in London and went on to suffer a 3-1 loss against hosts Belgium in a European tour in August.

England’s James Anderson (left) celebrates with England’s Stuart Broad after taking his 500th Test match wicket of West Indies’ Kraigg Brathwaite during the second day of the third Test match at Lords cricket ground in London yesterday.

Megabucks deal just the start, says IPL chairmanNew Delhi

AFP

The Indian Premier League is expecting even higher returns in the years ahead after striking

a bumper $2.55bn broadcast deal to become one of the world’s richest sports competitions.

IPL chairman Rajeev Shukla (pic-tured) believes there is plenty more growth to come for the glitzy Twenty20 cricket league, whose heady success comes despite its his-tory of corruption scandals.

This week Rupert Murdoch’s Star India beat rival bids from Facebook, Sony and India’s Airtel to land the IPL’s TV and digital rights over five years from 2018.

The deal, a four-fold increase after Sony paid $1.2 billion for broadcast rights over 10 years in 2008, puts the IPL on a similar level to football’s Eng-lish Premier League, a bellwether for global sports marketing.

The eight-week IPL’s 60 games are now valued at roughly $8.5 mil-lion each, not far off the estimated $9.6 million per Premier League match -- and well over the $6.2m price tag attached to home interna-tionals in India.

Shukla said he wasn’t surprised at the IPL’s new earning power, which is tipped to have a wide-ranging impact on cricket, much as Kerry Packer’s renegade World Series Cricket of the 1970s ushered in a new era for the sport.

“Every year IPL is growing in

terms of reach, in terms of value and impact. In 10 years it has gone up manyfold and I hope in future also the enhancement will keep on happen-ing,” Shukla.

“Since the value of property has seen signficant gains with each pass-ing year so in future also it will keep on increasing,” he added.

The IPL has spawned copycat leagues in Australia, Pakistan and elsewhere, and has already swelled the bank accounts of scores of play-ers, making domestic T20 a lucrative alternative to the international game.

India captain Virat Kohli was the best-paid player at this year’s IPL, earning $2.26 million with Royal Chal-lengers Bangalore, while the most expensive foreigner was England’s Ben Stokes on $2.16m.

Earning hundreds of thousands of dollars a week -- albeit for only two months -- is usually the preserve of footballers and NBA players, but IPL

cricketers can expect a step-change in their wages next year.

“It’s a game-changer, not only in Indian cricket but world cricket. The kind of money that’s generated in India through cricket is enormous,” former India captain Mohammad Azharuddin said.

“You never know what’s in store. If you compare it to EPL then an IPL player’s worth can be even more in coming years. The bar is raised and I am all for players making money,” he added. Many critics are concerned the growing sums on offer will have a negative impact on international cricket, as players prioritise earning money over representing their countries.

But Delhi Daredevils spinner Shahbaz Nadeem, as yet uncapped by India, said international cricket remained the pinnacle for players.

“Money is no doubt a factor in IPL but the ultimate goal is to represent your country. Yes, IPL can act as a good launchpad for showcasing your talent,” the 28-year-old said.

The IPL, which is broadcast around the world, is hugely popular for its mix of sport and showbiz, with a number of teams fronted by Bolly-wood stars. It is the brainchild of Indian cricket administrator Lalit Modi, who is now in Britain and refus-ing to return to his home country to face corruption charges. The IPL was also hit by a spot-fixing scandal in 2013 which led to the Chennai Super Kings and Rajasthan Royals being sus-pended for two seasons in 2015.

Pakistan’s Ali seeks to bowl out Amla Lahore, Pakistan

AFP

Pakistani bowling sensation Hassan Ali said Fri-day he wants to bowl out South Africa’s Hashim Amla when he plays an international

before a home crowd for the first time at next week’s World XI tour in Lahore.

Ali, 23, the highest wicket-taker at the Cham-pions Trophy which underdogs Pakistan won earlier this year, said he “can’t wait” to take on the star-studded World XI in the three-match Twenty20 series.

It is the highest-profile international fixture to take place in Pakistan since a deadly militant attack eight years ago drove international cricket -- and most other sports -- from the country.

“This is my first international match on my home ground in Pakistan. I’m very excited to play in front of my home crowd on my home ground,” he told reporters after a practice session at the stadium yesterday.

The attack on the Sri Lankan team in Lahore in March 2009, which killed eight people and wounded nine, isolated Pakistan, forcing it to host its “home” fixtures in neutral venues.

Ali said he was “sad” about this, but put the inter-national players who are coming for the World XI on notice: especially Amla.

“The World XI is a good team, it has very good players, I will try to bowl well to all of them. Especially I would like to out brother Hashim Amla, it would give me more pleasure,” he said.

He said he would partner with strike bowler Mohammad Aamir to take as many wickets as possible.

“There are partnerships in bowling too just like batting. If one bowler in the pair is being thrashed, the other tries to contain, so there is no competition.”

La Liga mulls Barca and Real games abroadMadrid

AFP

The likes of Real Madrid and Barcelona may soon play competitive

La Liga games in China or the United States, Spanish league president Javier Tebas revealed yesterday.

Tebas suggested the stag-ing of La Liga games abroad from next season would help Spanish soccer compete for foreign revenue with its Eng-lish and German rivals.

“It would only be one or two games a season, like the NFL or NBA do,” said Tebas.

“If we want to compete with the Premier League or the Bundesliga we have to look for added value,” he said.

“We would look into it deeply before presenting the idea to the clubs, there are legal and social implications and you’d have to look at the hours too,” he said.

“But it’s not a bad idea.”The 55-year-old Tebas

has been in the news of late accusing Qatari-owned French side Paris Saint-Ger-main of “laughing” at UEFA’s the financial fair play (FFP) system.

The NFL has been staging games in London since 2007, calling those game the ‘Inter-national Series’. The NBA calls its version the Global Games, with two or three matches each season in places such as China, Brazil or France.

French GP aiming for reduced crowd and congestionLondon

Reuters

Organisers of the first French Formula One Grand Prix in a decade

are aiming for a race day crowd of around 70,000 when the event returns to Le Castellet next

year and hope to avoid the traf-fic snarls of the past.

The circuit, on a plateau between Marseille and Toulon, could accommodate 20,000 more but commercial director Aurelie Letellier told Reuters that they would not go for full capac-ity in year one.

“We are confident we can have a big capacity but we are also being very humble,” she said. “So we are working on an estimate of accommodating 65-70,000 people for the race. That is a reasonable objective.”

That number would be less

than in the final years at Magny-Cours, a track in the rural heart of the country whose last grand prix in 2008 drew a Sunday attendance of 78,000.

Le Castellet, also known as the Circuit Paul Ricard, hosted 14 grands prix between 1971 and 1990 before being converted into

a high-tech test track under the ownership of a trust linked to former Formula One supremo Bernie Ecclestone.

Road access was always a problem in the old days and Letelier said traffic management had been top of the list of priorities.

Anderson joins 500 wicket clubLondon

AFP

James Anderson became the first England bowler to take 500 Test wickets and just

the sixth in history when he dismissed West Indies opener Kraigg Brathwaite on the sec-ond day of the third Test at Lord’s yesterday.

Anderson, who started West Indies’ second innings on 499 Test wickets, reached the landmark when, with the last delivery of his second over, he bowled Brathwaite between bat and pad for four with a big inswinger that demolished the right-hand-er’s middle stump.

Anderson is just the sixth bowler and only the third paceman to have taken 500 Test wickets.

He is also the only active cricketer in that elite group, with the spin trio of Sri Lan-ka’s Muttiah Muralitharan (800 Test wickets), Austral-ia’s Shane Warne (708), India’s Anil Kumble (619), as well as Australia seamer Glenn McGrath (563) and West Indies fast bowler Courtney Walsh (519) now all retired.

Walsh, the first bowler to 500 Test wickets back in 2001, also took 129 matches to reach the landmark figure.

West Indies (I innings): .........................123England (I innings):A Cook c Dowrich b Roach ......................................10

M Stoneman c Dowrich b Roach ..............................1

T Westley lbw Holder .................................................8

J Root c Powell b Holder ............................................1

D Malan c Dowrich b Roach ..................................20

B Stokes b Gabriel ...................................................60

J Bairstow lbw Roach...............................................21

M Ali c K Hope b Roach ............................................. 3

T Roland-Jones c S Hope b Holder ........................ 13

S Broad c Dowrich b Holder ...................................38

J Anderson (not out) ..................................................8

Extras (LB-4, NB-7) ...................................................11

Total (all out) ......................................... 194

Fall of wickets: 1-1, 2-15, 3-19, 4-24, 5-63, 6-119,

7-128, 8-134, 9-163, 10-194.

Bowling: Roach 24-8-72-5; Gabriel 15-1-64-1 (6nb);

Holder 13.5-1-54-4 (1nb).

West Indies (II innings):K Brathwaite b Anderson .........................................4

K Powell b Anderson .............................................. 45

K Hope lbw b Broad ....................................................1

S Hope (batting) .......................................................35

R Chase (batting) ....................................................... 3

Extras (LB-5) ................................................................5

Total (for 3 wkts)..................................... 93Fall of wickets: 1-6, 2-21, 3-69.

Bowling: J Anderson 9-2-17-2; S Broad 8-2-25-1; T

Roland-Jones 6-2-17-0; B Stokes 8-2-29-0.

SCOREBOARD

18 SATURDAY 9 SEPTEMBER 2017SPORT

Sanchez has mentality to deliver for Arsenal: WengerLondon

AFP

Arsene Wenger says his star forward Alexis Sanchez has the mentality to deliver for Arsenal

despite suffering the disappoint-ment of an aborted transfer to Manchester City.

The London club reportedly agreed a fee for the Chilean for-ward on transfer deadline day, only for the deal to collapse after Wenger was unable to complete a move for Monaco winger Tho-mas Lemar.

But Wenger believes Sanchez is in the right mental state to respond positively for Arsenal as they prepare to take on Bournemouth today follow-ing a 4-0 drubbing at Liverpool.

“I have no doubt about Alex-is’s mind and mentality,” the Frenchman said of the player who scored 30 times last sea-son. “People question and he needs to come back to full fit-ness, not what he was at Liverpool.

“It was his first game. He had a negative experience with Chile and will be back quickly to his best.”

Sanchez looked miserable during Arsenal’s 4-0 thrashing at Liverpool prior to the inter-national break and then suffered successive defeats with Chile in World Cup qualifying.

“I believe the transfer mar-ket is over and for us there was a lot going on,” said Wenger,

whose side are languishing towards the bottom of the Pre-mier League table after a poor start to the season.

“My view is it is very difficult to speak about that because Lemar is at Monaco and focuses there and Sanchez is here and focuses here. After that we have to keep a certain confidentiality about transfer negotiations and the transfer market is part of that. Many things happen in the last second what I regret.”

English Premier League clubs voted on Thursday to close the 2018 close-season transfer window before the start of the 2018-19 campaign.

“It is important to change that before the championship starts,” said Wenger, speaking at his weekly press conference at Arsenal’s London Colney training base. “Players have no clarity. Are they in or are they out?

“Are they half in and half out? Are they tapped up in the after-noon of the game by people who want to get them out? It’s not the way to work. It’s time to kick that out before the season and not have players in the dressing room half out and half in.”

When asked if the decision to sell England midfielder Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain, Wenger

responded: “I wouldn’t call it like that. We wish him well and all the best and thank him. You make decisions. You choose one or the other. “We had to sell somebody. Overall we are in a strong financial position as always. That does not take away the quality of Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain but that opens the door for younger players to get an opportunity they won’t get.”

Wenger refused to confirm whether Jack Wilshere, who spent last season on loan at Bournemouth, will make his long-awaited Arsenal return after injury against his former club.

Chelsea manager Antonio Conte during a press conference on the eve of English Premier League match against defending champions Leicester City.

Pele delighted by Neymar’s PSG switchParis

AFP

Brazilian legend Pele hailed Neymar’s move from Barcelona to Paris

Saint-Germain as an oppor-tunity for his compatriot to “be the big star”, in an inter-view with goal.com on Friday.

Pele, who won the World Cup three times as a player and scored over 1,000 goals during his career, said that it would be good for Neymar to leave the shadow of former Barca teammate Lionel Messi.

“For Neymar, I think it (moving to PSG) was the best thing,” he said.

“I think it was the best thing because there was always the discussion, ‘Ney-mar, Messi, Neymar, Messi’. Now, he will have the oppor-tunity to be the big star.”

Neymar spent four sea-sons with Barcelona before joining big-spending PSG in a world-record transfer worth 222m euros ($267m).

The 25-year-old forward started out at Santos, where Pele played for the majority of his glittering career.

“It’s a great responsibility he has now,” Pele, 76, added.

“Because people started comparing Neymar to Messi. And as a Brazilian, I say that there’s no doubt that Neymar is one of the best in his posi-tion, because we have Cristiano Ronaldo who is a centre-forward as well.

“But with Messi it’s a bit different. Messi is an organ-iser and he also scores goals.”

Berlin

AFP

Top striker Robert Lewandowski has said Bayern Munich must

spend more on star players or risk being left trailing their rivals.

“Bayern have to think something up and be more creative if the club wants to attract a world-class player to Munich,” Lewandowski told magazine Der Spiegel in a critical interview.

“If you want to play on the front foot, you need the quality players.”

Bayern set a new Bundes-liga record in June by signing France midfielder Corentin Tolisso from Lyon for 41.5m euros ($49.9m).

However, the figure was dwarfed by the 222m euros Paris Saint-Germain, who Bayern face in their Champi-ons League group, paid Barcelona for Neymar.

In July, Bayern president Uli Hoeness described the inflated fees as “madness. That’s something that we will refuse totally at Bayern”.

However, Lewandowski says they need to spend big if they are realistic about win-ning the Champions League for the first time since 2013.

“To date, Bayern has never paid more than around 40 million euros for a player,” added the Poland striker.

“In international football, that has long since been a fig-ure which is only average, rather than at the top.”

Lewandowski says the gap between what Bayern spend and what PSG paid for Neymar and France striker Kylian Mbappe, who they signed in a deal which could reach 180m euros, is “really huge”.

“Paris has bought up a world-class squad, whether or not that will become a world-class team, we will have to wait and see,” said Lewandowski.

“Bayern Munich, as a team, has experienced a lot together.

“Football is pure capital-ism, everyone wants to make money in this sector.”

Lewandowski says Euro-pean football’s governing body UEFA should investigate the huge transfers.

“UEFA must look into the huge transfers this summer and work alongside FIFA to close any holes in the regula-tions,” added Lewandowski.

Meanwhile, head coach Carlo Ancelotti says rotation will sort out any issues in his star-studded squad as Bay-ern start a heavy fixture list.

The defending champions are at Hoffenheim on Satur-day in the first of six matches this month.

Bayern host Anderlecht on Tuesday in their opening Champions League match, then Mainz, Schalke, Wolfs-burg and travel to face PSG in rapid succession.

Germany star Thomas Mueller was left out of the starting line-up for the 2-0 win at Werder Bremen a fort-night ago while new signing James Rodriguez is also in contention for the attacking midfield role after injury.

Mueller moaned to the German media after being benched at Bremen, but Ancelotti says no player has a guaranteed place.

“He (Mueller) is fit, he could play tomorrow, but we have a lot of good and important players and I can’t go through the sea-son with 11 players,” said Ancelotti.

Lewandowski criticises Bayern’s spending policy

41 cities bidding for 2026 World Cup gamesLos Angeles

AFP

Forty-one cities in Canada, Mexico and the United States have submitted bids

to serve as host cities for the 2026 World Cup, officials said on Thursday.

The joint North American bid is seen as the favorite for 2026, with only one other bid -- Morocco -- so far in the run-ning for the tournament.

The list of 41 cities has been finalised after three cities invited to submit bids -- San Diego, Green Bay and Calgary -- failed to do so.

The US-Mexico-Canada World Cup bid will submit between 20-25 venues in its final bid to FIFA, with 12 loca-tions likely to be chosen as host cities for the tournament, which will be the first to use FIFA’s

expanded 48-team format.“We’re thrilled with the

submissions that we have received, especially each city’s commitment to innovation and sustainability,” the bid commit-tee’s executive director John Kristick said.

Cities not hosting games could be chosen as other ven-ues needed for the tournament, such as team base camps, a statement said.

Bid officials have said 60 of the tournament’s matches would be staged in the United States, with Canada and Mex-ico hosting 10 games each.

The United States will host all knockout games from the quarter-finals onwards.

Stadiums under consider-ation in the United States include several venues used in the 1994 World Cup, including the Pasadena Rose Bowl.

AS Monaco football club’s Russian Vice-President Vadim Vasilyev pose with newly recruited (from left) Yugoslavian forward Stevan Jovetic, French midfielder Rachid Ghezzal, Spanish forward Keita Balde and French forward Adama Diakhaby on Thursday in Monaco.

Old boy Hughes out to end Man United’s 100% startStoke-on-Trent

AFP

Manchester United have made the perfect start to the Premier League

season, but one of their most fondly remembered former strikers is plotting their downfall.

Jose Mourinho’s side have begun the campaign with three wins from three matches, with-out conceding a goal, and start the weekend top of the table as they prepare to visit Stoke City today.

But they have not won at the bet365 Stadium since United old boy Mark Hughes became Stoke’s manager in 2013 and midfielder Ander Herrera knows his side are in for a difficult afternoon.

“The Premier League is very long and every team can beat you,” Herrera said.

“Now we have to face Stoke and we’ve had four seasons without winning there. It’s been a good way to start the season, but we cannot relax.

“We are ready to face them and, hopefully, the weather is not so bad there because, when it is bad, it is very difficult to play.

“We are ready. No excuses -- let’s try to win there. We are Manchester United, so we are not scared.”

United appear to be in the mood to secure a first away victory over Stoke since April 2013.

Romelu Lukaku experienced the first setback of his United career when he saw a penalty

saved during their last league match, a 2-0 victory over Leicester City.

But he shrugged off the dis-appointment during the international break, scoring four times in two matches for Bel-gium as they secured qualification for next year’s World Cup in Russia.

Marcus Rashford, a scoring substitute against Leicester, has made a strong claim to return to the starting line-up after his fine winner against Slovakia moved England closer to a World Cup place of their own.

Rashford’s form puts extra pressure on Anthony Martial, who was overlooked by France coach Didier Deschamps for the fourth international get-together in succession.

Former Colombian footballer Carlos Valderrama (right), who played in three World Cup tournaments, poses for pictures with former Indian cricket captain Sourabh Ganguly during an event ahead of the FIFA U-17 World Cup tournament in India, in Kolkata yesterday.

19SATURDAY 9 SEPTEMBER 2017 SPORT

Al Sadd and Duhail eye season’s first silverwareArmstrong Vas The Peninsula

Al Sadd and Al Duhail will be looking to kick off the new season in style by picking up the first

silverware in the one-match season-opener Sheikh Jassim Cup at Sheikh Abdullah bin Kha-lifa Stadium her today.

Al Duhail, which won the Qatar Stars League title last sea-son as Lekhwiya, will be looking to get off to the best starts for the long and challenging season ahead.

Coach Djamel Belmadi’s side will face fierce competition from Al Sadd team, which won two local titles last year - Qatar Cup and Emir’s Cup, when the two sides kick off at 7.00pm today.

Belmadi, who managed to retain the hot seat as coach of Duhail in the unification of Lekhwiya and El Jaish teams, said his team is keen to begin the campaign on a winning note.

“It’s an important match for us and we’ll want to win the title and begin the season on a pos-itive note,” said the Algerian during a press conference.

Belmadi said his team is

looking forward to the match against Al Sadd which he said is an ideal prepara-tion for the long and tough road ahead.

“It’s always a challenge to take on Al Sadd but there is no better way to prepare for the long season ahead. We have prepared well and are looking for-ward for a good result. We aim for success in every season. My mission is to work with the players on achiev-ing the best results.”

“It’s going to a difficult season as most of the teams will be hoping to do w e l l , ” a d d e d Belmadi.

B e l m a d i ’ s o p p o s i t e number, Al Sadd coach Jesu-aldo Ferreira said his side will miss a number of players going into the match as they are on the injured list.

“We’re missing some impor-tant players, for sure it will have

an impact on our performance,” said Ferreira.

The Wolves will be without experienced centre-back Ibra-him Majid and Pedro Miguel in the season’s first competition.

The Portuguese said, besides injuries, his team missed

players who were busy with World Cup qualifying duty for Qatar and Iran and informed they joined the team only on Wednesday.

“There are injuries and some of the players have just joined. We haven’t settled on a line-up

yet. We didn’t play any official match in four months. The last match we played was in the Emir Cup final against Al Rayyan,” Ferreira added.

“It would not be easy for the team because we are going to face one of the best teams in Qatar,” he added.

M e a n w h i l e Duhail’s Abdulrah-man Abker said he is keen to made an ‘ideal’ start to the season.

“We aim to win our first title of the season and make an ideal start to the year ahead. It will also motivate us to do well in the (QNB S t a r s L e a g u e ) league.”

Abker praised the backroom staff for keeping the players fit during the off season.

“Thank God, the coaching staff have worked hard with the players and helped them to reach their highest level of physical fitness.”

Keys, Stephens book all-American title showdown New York

AFP

Americans Sloane Stephens and Madison Keys, both struggling with serious injuries just three

months ago, advanced to their first Grand Slam final at the US Open on Thursday.

Stephens, who missed 11 months with a left foot injury before return-ing in July, outlasted seven-time Slam champion Venus Williams 6-1, 0-6, 7-5.

“I’m super happy to be in a Grand Slam final,” Stephens said. “To do it here, my home slam, is obviously more special. I think this is what every player dreams about.”

US 15th seed Keys, who had left wrist surgery for the second time in 10 months after a first-round French Open exit, routed US 20th seed CoCo Vandeweghe 6-1, 6-2 in 66 minutes to complete the first all-American US Open final since Serena Williams beat sister Venus in 2002.

“It still doesn’t feel real. I’m still shaking,” Keys said.

“I played pretty well. There’s a lot of things in my head right now so I’m struggling to come up with words.

“I knew I had to rise to the occa-sion. I’m just happy to be in the final.”

The friends and Fed Cup team-mates will meet today at Arthur Ashe Stadium in the biggest match of either’s career for a top prize of $3.7m.

“I’ve known her for a long time. She’s one of my closest friends on tour,” Stephens said. “I love her to death. And it’s not easy playing a friend.”

Stephens, who was wearing a walking boot in June and ranked 957th in July, has won 14 of her past 16 matches, with semi-final runs at Toronto and Cincinnati.

“I have no words to describe what I’m feeling, what it took to get here, the journey I’ve been on,” Stephens said.

“It’s incredible. I don’t know how I got here. Your guess is as good as mine. Just hard work. That’s it.”

Stephens beat Keys in the sec-ond round at Miami in 2015 in their only career meeting.

“Sloane is a new person right now,” Keys said.

“She’s so excited to be out on the

court again. I’m excited we get to play each other in the US Open final.”

Stephens needed a thrilling break at love in the penultimate game and closing hold of serve to deny two-time champion Williams her first US Open final in 15 years.

“I just worked my tail off and tried to run every ball down and here we are,” Stephens said. “It required a lot of fight and a lot of grit.”

Now 83rd, Stephens is the low-est-ranked Slam finalist since unranked Justine Henin at the 2010 Australian Open and the lowest at the US Open since unranked Kim Cli-jsters won the 2009 title.

Stephens, who beat Williams in the first round of the 2015 French Open in their only prior meeting, will jump into the world top 25 next week with the victory.

US ninth seed Williams could not overcome 51 unforced errors that doomed her bid to become the old-est women’s singles finalist in US Open history at age 37.

“It was definitely well com-peted,” Williams said. “In the end she won more points than I did and that’s what it added up to.

“Just made so many errors at the end there... I wasn’t playing well. Just wasn’t playing well.”

Williams will return to the top five in Monday’s world rankings for the first time since 2011, the year she was diagnosed with strength-sap-ping Sjogren’s Syndrome.

Stephens, 24, is 4-0 in WTA finals, having won titles in 2015 at Washington and last year in Auck-land, Acapulco and Charleston.

The only cautionary note for Keys, 22, was a medical timeout to have her right leg taped three games from the end.

“I definitely started to feel it,” she said.

“I felt if I went too far it might be something more.”

It was the first all-American US Open women’s semi-finals since 1981 and the first at any Slam since Wim-bledon in 1985.

All-American finalFirst-time Grand Slam finalists

Stephens and Keys are the first

Americans to meet in a US

Open final since Serena

Williams defeated older sister

Venus Williams in the 2002

final. But it has only been since

January’s Australian Open that

two Americans have met in a

Slam final, with a pregnant

Serena carrying the day again

over Venus Williams.

How low can you go and win?At 83rd in the world rankings,

Sloane Stephens would be the

fourth-lowest-ranked Grand

Slam champion since computer

rankings began in 1975. Evonne

Goolagong was unranked when

she won the 1977 Australian

Open after giving birth to her

first daughter seven months

earlier. Kim Clijsters was

unranked after coming out of

retirement when she won the

2009 US Open.

And Chris O’Neil was ranked

111th when she won the 1978

Australian Open. Stephens

would also become just the

fifth unseeded player to win a

Grand Slam title in the Open

Era (since 1967) after O’Neil,

Clijsters, Serena Williams at the

2007 Australian Open and

Jelena Ostapenko in June at

the French Open.

First-time Slam winnersNo matter which American

captures the title on Saturday,

it will be the fifth time in the

past nine Grand Slam events

that a first-time Slam champion

is crowned. The run of new

major winners began on the

New York hardcourts and

includes Italy’s Flavia Pennetta

at the 2015 US Open,

Germany’s Angelique Kerber at

the 2016 Australian Open,

Spain’s Garbine Muguruza at

the 2016 French Open and

Latvia’s Jelena Ostapenko at

this year’s French Open. The

last American to become a

first-time Slam winner was

Jennifer Capriati at the 2001

Australian Open.

US OPEN WOMEN’S FINAL

WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW

Sloane Stephens of USA competes against Venus Williams of USA in their Women’s Singles semi-final of the 2017 US Open at Arthur Ashe Stadium in New York, United States on Thursday. Stephens outlasted seven-time Slam champion Williams 6-1, 0-6, 7-5 to march into the final. INSET: Madison Keys of the US reacts after winning a point against CoCo Vandeweghe during their 2017 US Open Women’s Singles semi-final match on Thursday. Keys won 6-1, 6-2.

US OPEN WOMEN’S FINAL

The friends and Fed Cup team-mates will meet today at Arthur Ashe Stadium in the biggest match of either’s career for a top prize of $3.7m.

US 15th seed Madison Keys, who had left wrist surgery for the second time in 10 months after a first-round French Open exit, routed US 20th seed CoCo Vandeweghe 6-1, 6-2 in 66 minutes to complete the first all-American US Open final since Serena Williams beat sister Venus in 2002.

Sloane Stephens, who missed 11 months with a left foot injury before returning in July, outlasted seven-time Slam champion Venus Williams 6-1, 0-6, 7-5 in semi-final.

Al Duhail coach Djamel Belmadi (left) and Al Sadd coach Jesualdo Ferreira addressing the gathering during a pre-match press conference held at the Al Duhail Sports Club on Thursday.

Froome holds firm; De Gendt wins sprint Gijon, Spain

AFP

Sky’s Chris Froome inched closer to his dream of adding the Vuelta a

Espana to his Tour de France title, by maintaining his 1min 37sec lead over key rival Vin-cenzo Nibali in the 19th stage yesterday.

Four-time and reigning Tour de France winner Froome is now hot favourite to become only the third rider to clinch the French-Spanish double in the same year.

Belgium’s Thomas de Gendt won a bunch sprint ahead of Jarlinson Pantano and Ivan Garcia at the finish line in the Atlantic coastal town of Gijon, to join a small circle of riders to have clinched stage wins in all three Grand Tours.

The day’s racing, how-ever, was lit up by a heroic escape bid from fading local s u p e r s t a r A l b e r t o Contador.

Contador launched his attack on the last climb and opened up a lead of over a minute, before being reeled in with 2km to race.

Froome, Nibali and Wilco Kelderman, third overall at 2min 17sec.

Italian photographer Marco Longari answers visitors’ questions during his exhibition entitled “Crowds and solitude in Africa” as part of the International Festival of Photojournalism “Visa pour l’image” in Perpignan, yesterday.

Photo exhibition

SATURDAY 9 SEPTEMBER 2017

FAJRSHOROOK

04.00 am

05.17 am

ZUHRASR

11.31 am

03.00 pm

MAGHRIBISHA

05.47 pm

07.17 pm

PRAYER TIMINGS

HIGH TIDE 06:00 – 18:30 LOW TIDE 00:30 – 11:45

Poor visibility expected at places by

early morning. Hazy to misty / foggy

at places at first becomes hot day-

time with some clouds and humid

by night.

WEATHER TODAY

Minimum Maximum

Courtesy: Qatar Meteorology Department

31oC 43oC

20 MORNING BREAK

Astana

AFP

Wild tigers could be returning to Kazakhstan after a groundbreaking reintroduc-

tion plan was signed off yesterday. Seven decades since poaching and

habitat destruction wiped out indige-nous stocks of the giant cats, it is hoped they will once again roam free -- but experts said it will take years.

The Central Asian country’s agree-ment with the World Wildlife Fund requires it to gradually integrate Amur tigers, closely related to the extinct Caspian tiger, that disappeared from

its southeastern Ili-Balkhash region in the mid-20th century.

The fund is providing $10 million (8.3 million euros) for the project that will see Kazakhstan become the first country to reintroduce a population of large cats back into a territory follow-ing an extinction.

WWF’s Russian representative Igor Chestin hailed the signing as a “event of global significance” but warned reintroducing tigers into the country will take “years”.

“It will be years before tigers appear on this territory because the territory needs to be specially pre-pared,” Chestin said at a press conference in the Kazakh capital

Astana. Kazakh Agriculture Minister Askar Myrzakhmetov said work on a specially protected natural area for the tigers would start at the beginning of next year.

“In fact, we are talking about restoring a whole ecosystem, where this species is set to be reintroduced,” Myrzakhmetov said at the press conference.

According to a scientific article on the introduction, co-authored by the WWF’s Chestin, Caspian tigers inhab-ited a range taking in 13 modern-day countries with Turkey and China at its extremes just prior to the turn of the century. The Soviet Union sped up the a n i m a l ’ s e x t i n c t i o n

with mass irrigation and agricultural development that cut into the partly wooded habitat it inhabited along with its prey, mainly boar and deer.

Bounty hunting was also rife in the early Soviet period.

The Caspian tiger is generally thought to have become extinct glo-bally in the mid to late 20th century.

Numbers of wild tigers as a whole have dwindled precipitously over the last century, plunging from 100,000 to fewer than 4,000 across a dozen countries today. In 2016 tigers were declared “functionally extinct” by the WWF in Cambodia, with the last big cat seen on a camera trap there in 2007.

Wild tigers to reappear in Kazakhstan after 70 years

Toronto

AP

Lady Gaga says that she’s planning to take a “rest” from music and “slow down for a moment for some healing.”

The pop star was at in Toronto yesterday for a pair of concerts and to premiere a Netflix doc-umentary about herself, “Gaga: Five Foot Two.” The film, playing at the Toronto International Film Festival, chronicles her life, February’s Super Bowl performance and her struggle with chronic pain.

Gaga teared up speaking to reporters about her health issues. “It’s hard,” she said, “but it’s lib-erating too.” The singer said that she’ll still be creating during a break from music. “It doesn’t mean I don’t have some things up my sleeve,” said Gaga. Gaga recently shot a remake of “A Star is Born,” co-starring Bradley Cooper.

Lady Gaga taking a ‘rest’ from musicHouston

QNA

Scientists have developed a pen-like device that accurately identifies cancerous tissue during sur-gery in 10 seconds that improve treatments and

reduce the chances of cancer recurrence. The MasSpec Pen, developed by researchers from

University of Texas, Austin in the US, is a handheld instrument that gives surgeons precise diagnostic information about what tissue to cut or preserve dur-ing surgery.

The current methods for diagnosing cancers and determining the boundary between cancer and nor-mal tissue during surgery, is slow and sometimes inaccurate.

Each sample takes 30 minutes or more to prepare and interpret by a pathologist, which increases the risk of infection in patients.

However, in tests on tissues removed from 253 human cancer patients, the MasSpec Pen took about 10 seconds to provide a diagnosis and was more than 96 percent accurate.

The technology was also able to detect cancer in marginal regions between normal and cancer tissues that presented mixed cellular composition.

Living cells, whether they are healthy or cancer-ous, produce small molecules called metabolites. These molecules are involved in all the important processes of life - such as generating energy, growing and repro-ducing - as well as other useful functions such as removing toxins, researchers said.

Each type of cancer produces a unique set of metabolites and other bio markers that act as fingerprints.

“Since the metabolites in cancer and normal cells are so different, we extract and analyse them with the MasSpec Pen to obtain a molecular fingerprint of the tissue,” said Livia Schiavinato Eberlin, Assistant Pro-fessor at University of Texas, Austin.

Scientists invent pen that detects cancer in 10 seconds

Venice

Reuters

Veteran director Abdellatif Kechiche premiered his coming of age drama “Mektoub, My Love: Canto Uno”, which is in competition for the top

award at the Venice Film Festival.Taking audiences back to 1994, the film follows a

group of youths spending the summer together in a small fishing village in the south of France drinking, dancing and going to the beach. When asked about the way the women in the film are portrayed, Kechiche denied taking a “macho approach”. “I describe strong women - free women ... among the scenes I have shot, you will see that most of the scenes focused on the faces,” Kechiche said.

Tokyo

AFP

Do your feet smell bad? Just a little or absolutely awful? If you don’t dare to ask a friend, one Japanese

start-up might have the answer with a new robot dog that will sniff your feet and give you a pitilessly honest verdict -- even fainting if the stink is especially strong.

Malodorous feet can be socially awk-ward in Japan where shoes are removed at the entrance to every home.

Hana-chan -- a play on the Japanese word for “nose” and a common girl’s nick-name -- is a helpful little robot mutt who will bark if she detects moderately whiffy toes, but will keel over if the pong is par-ticularly pungent. The 15-centimetre (6-inch) dog, equipped with an odour detection sensor for a nose, also sprays air freshener to resolve the situation if the aroma is unbearable. Manufacturers Next Technology created the robot in response to a request from a man who was desper-ate to know if he had a problem.

“He told us his daughter had said his feet were smelly... But he didn’t want to know how bad the odour was because he would feel hurt,” employee Kimika Tsuji said. “That’s why we developed this cute robot.” Tsuji said smells are becoming more of an issue in Japan, a place where subjecting others to your honking body can even be considered harassment.

In July, Konica Minolta, a Japanese tech company, began pre-sales of a pocket-sized device that allows people to self-test three categories of smell on a scale from 0 to 100.

New Japanese robot dog sniffs out smelly feet

New York

IANS

One in three animal parasites, one of the most threatened groups of life on Earth, may face

extinction by 2070, as a result of glo-bal climate change, a study has warned.

The study determined that para-sites are even more threatened than the animal hosts they rely on and thus should be included in conversations about conservation. Loss of parasite,

which help control wildlife numbers and keep energy flowing through food chains, could dramatically disrupt eco-systems. On the other hand, having parasites indicates that the ecosystem has been stable. “Parasites are defi-nitely going to face major extinction risk in the next 50 years,” said lead author Colin Carlson, graduate student at the University of California - Berkeley.

“They are certainly as threatened as any other animal group,” Carlson added. In the study, published in the

journal Science Advances, the most catastrophic model predicted that more than a third of parasite species worldwide could be lost by 2070, while the most optimistic models predicted a loss of about 10 per cent.

“[Slowing climate change] has a really profound impact on extinction rates, but even in the best-case sce-nario, we’re still looking at fairly major global changes,” Carlson said.

“Having parasites means the eco-system has a diversity of animals in it and that conditions have

been consistent long enough for these complex associations to develop,” noted Anna J. Phillips, zoologist at the Smithsonian Institution National Museum of Natural History in Wash-ington D.C.

For the study, 17 researchers from eight countries tracked geospatial information of 457 parasite species including worms, fleas, lice and oth-ers. Using climate forecasts, the researchers compared these will be impacted by changes in climate under various scenarios.

Kechiche’s new drama

By 2070, a third of animal parasites may be extinct: Study