By Pakinam Amer
Associated Press Writer
First Published: 11 Feb., 2008 10:20
Cairo - An Egyptian appeals court on Monday spared an Al-Jazeera journalist a six-month prison sentence by overturning a ruling that she tarnished the country's reputation after running a report on police torture, a judicial official and her lawyer said.
But the court upheld Howaida Taha's conviction on a separate charge that she fabricated videotapes used in the documentary and maintained a 20,000 Egyptian pound (about US$3,600) fine imposed on her, said a judicial official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media.
Taha, a documentary producer for the pan-Arab satellite station who is known for her criticism of the Egyptian regime, was first detained in January 2007 for two days for possessing 50 video tapes that police alleged contained fabricated scenes of torture by Egyptian police. At the time, she said the footage was a "reconstruction" for a documentary.
She was sentenced in May to six months in jail after a Cairo state security court found her guilty of "harming the country's interests" and "fabricating" the torture scenes.
Taha's lawyer, Ahmed Helmi, said he planned to take the case to the country's highest court, the Court of Cassation, in hope that the conviction on the second charge of fabricating the videotapes would be overturned.
"For now, we will pay the fine but the conviction in her case is really baseless. That is why we will proceed with the case," he said.
Taha is currently in Doha, Qatar, where she lives and where Al-Jazeera is based.
The torture documentary, "Beyond the Sun," was aired on Al-Jazeera in April, as Taha had kept copies of the confiscated tapes.
Rights groups say torture, including sexual abuse, is routinely conducted in Egyptian police stations. The government denies systematic torture but has investigated several officers on allegations of abuse. Some were convicted and sentenced to prison.
During her last visit to Egypt late January, Taha was again briefly detained and questioned along with her crew before being released.
She was taken into custody while filming in a low-income neighborhood in Cairo for allegedly not having official permission to film, her lawyer and police had said.
Police also confiscated her tapes and sent them to be inspected by the Department of Artistic Inspection.
Taha has said she did obtain the proper permission to film but said she was later told that she also needed a separate permission from the Interior Ministry _ something she said was not part of normal procedure.
The documentary she was working on when she was last detained deals with people living on the edge of society.
Link: http://www.wtop.com/?nid=500&sid=1343495
Monday, February 18, 2008
FLAG Telecom: Repair ship to get next week to site of damaged Internet cables off Egyptian coast (AP)
By Pakinam Amer
Associated Press Writer
First Published: 1 Feb., 2008 06:52
Cairo - A repair ship is expected to arrive next week to the site of severed cables off the northern coast of Egypt to begin repair work on the damage that has disrupted Internet services across the Middle East and India, a leading provider of international network services said Friday.
The U.K-based FLAG Telecom said in an e-mail sent to The Associated Press that the ship was to arrive Tuesday on the location in the Mediterranean Sea. The repair work will likely be completed in a week of the ship's arrival, it said.
In a separate statement, FLAG Telecom reported that a different undersea Internet cable, FALCON, also belonging to the company, had been cut Friday at 0559 GMT at a location 56 kilometers (34.8 miles) from Dubai, on a stretch between the United Arab Emirates and Oman in the Persian Gulf.
There were no other details on this damage _ the first to be reported in the Persian Gulf.
But FLAG Telecom said that a "repair ship has been notified and expected to arrive at the site in the next few days," apparently referring to the Persian Gulf location.
Earlier, the company said its FLAG Europe-Asia cable in the Mediterranean was cut Wednesday morning, 8.3 kilometers (5 miles) from the Egyptian port of Alexandria, on a stretch linking Egypt to Italy. The company also said it was able to restore circuits to some customers and was switching to alternative routes for others.
It did not provide any details as to why it would take until Tuesday for the repair ship to arrive at a site so near the port of Alexandria. The harbor has been closed for most of this week because of bad weather.
Wednesday's damage to two undersea Internet cables off Egypt's coast disrupted Web access across a wide swath of Asia and the Middle East.
Egypt's Minister of Communications and Information Technology Tarek Kamil said Friday that the Internet service in the country would be up and running to about 80 percent of its usual capacity within 48 hours, revising an earlier statement that this level would be restored by late Friday.
"However, it's not before ten days until the Internet service returns to its normal performance," Kamil told the Friday edition of the state Al-Ahram newspaper. There are eight million Internet users in Egypt, according to a ministry count.
On Thursday, Kamil described the damage as an "earthquake" and said the reason behind the cut would only be determined after the repair teams with their robot equipment reach the damaged cables.
The official Middle East News Agency quoted the minister as saying technicians managed to raise the level of the Internet service Thursday to about 45 percent and that Telecom Egypt would get soon a bandwidth of 10 gigabyte to be increased to 13 gigabyte _ close to the country's total capacity of 16 gigabytes.
But Internet access remained sporadic or nonexistent Friday, the first day of the official Muslim weekend in the Middle East when all government offices and most businesses are closed.
Kamil, who said international telephone services have not been affected by the incident, also praised the cooperation among the country's companies with the ministry to share the service and the cooperation of international companies in France, Italy and southeast Asia.
The paper also said that on Thursday, the state Telecom Egypt communication company "sealed a deal" for a new 3,100 kilometer (1,900 miles) -long undersea cable between Egypt and France, also through the Mediterranean. That cable would take over 18 months to complete, the report said. It did not say who Telecom's partners in the deal were.
___
Associated Press Writer Zeina Karam contributed to this report from Beirut, Lebanon.
Associated Press Writer
First Published: 1 Feb., 2008 06:52
Cairo - A repair ship is expected to arrive next week to the site of severed cables off the northern coast of Egypt to begin repair work on the damage that has disrupted Internet services across the Middle East and India, a leading provider of international network services said Friday.
The U.K-based FLAG Telecom said in an e-mail sent to The Associated Press that the ship was to arrive Tuesday on the location in the Mediterranean Sea. The repair work will likely be completed in a week of the ship's arrival, it said.
In a separate statement, FLAG Telecom reported that a different undersea Internet cable, FALCON, also belonging to the company, had been cut Friday at 0559 GMT at a location 56 kilometers (34.8 miles) from Dubai, on a stretch between the United Arab Emirates and Oman in the Persian Gulf.
There were no other details on this damage _ the first to be reported in the Persian Gulf.
But FLAG Telecom said that a "repair ship has been notified and expected to arrive at the site in the next few days," apparently referring to the Persian Gulf location.
Earlier, the company said its FLAG Europe-Asia cable in the Mediterranean was cut Wednesday morning, 8.3 kilometers (5 miles) from the Egyptian port of Alexandria, on a stretch linking Egypt to Italy. The company also said it was able to restore circuits to some customers and was switching to alternative routes for others.
It did not provide any details as to why it would take until Tuesday for the repair ship to arrive at a site so near the port of Alexandria. The harbor has been closed for most of this week because of bad weather.
Wednesday's damage to two undersea Internet cables off Egypt's coast disrupted Web access across a wide swath of Asia and the Middle East.
Egypt's Minister of Communications and Information Technology Tarek Kamil said Friday that the Internet service in the country would be up and running to about 80 percent of its usual capacity within 48 hours, revising an earlier statement that this level would be restored by late Friday.
"However, it's not before ten days until the Internet service returns to its normal performance," Kamil told the Friday edition of the state Al-Ahram newspaper. There are eight million Internet users in Egypt, according to a ministry count.
On Thursday, Kamil described the damage as an "earthquake" and said the reason behind the cut would only be determined after the repair teams with their robot equipment reach the damaged cables.
The official Middle East News Agency quoted the minister as saying technicians managed to raise the level of the Internet service Thursday to about 45 percent and that Telecom Egypt would get soon a bandwidth of 10 gigabyte to be increased to 13 gigabyte _ close to the country's total capacity of 16 gigabytes.
But Internet access remained sporadic or nonexistent Friday, the first day of the official Muslim weekend in the Middle East when all government offices and most businesses are closed.
Kamil, who said international telephone services have not been affected by the incident, also praised the cooperation among the country's companies with the ministry to share the service and the cooperation of international companies in France, Italy and southeast Asia.
The paper also said that on Thursday, the state Telecom Egypt communication company "sealed a deal" for a new 3,100 kilometer (1,900 miles) -long undersea cable between Egypt and France, also through the Mediterranean. That cable would take over 18 months to complete, the report said. It did not say who Telecom's partners in the deal were.
___
Associated Press Writer Zeina Karam contributed to this report from Beirut, Lebanon.
Fallout from Mideast damage from cut cables spreads to India (AP)
By Pakinam Amer
Associated Press Writer
First Published: 31 Jan., 2008 10:03
Cairo - Fallout spread Thursday from a cut in two undersea Internet cables off Egypt's coast, with India waking up to half of its bandwidth disrupted and widespread outages still hampering a wide swathe of the Mideast.
Officials said it could take a week or more to fix the cables, in part because of bad weather. Officials in several countries were scrambling to reroute traffic to satellites and to other cables through Asia.
In all, users in India, Pakistan, Egypt, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait and Bahrain were affected. Israel was unaffected by the outages because its Internet traffic is connected to Europe through a different undersea cable, and Lebanon and Iraq were also operating normally.
The biggest impact to the rest of the world could come from the outages across India _ where many U.S. companies outsource back-office operations including customer service call centers.
The outage also raised questions about the system's vulnerability. A Gulf analyst called it a "wake-up call" while an analyst in London cautioned that no one, including the West, was immune to such disruptions.
They could have a "massive impact on businesses," said Alex Burmaster, from Nielsen Online in London, and ordinary people "probably couldn't imagine" a life without the Internet.
Large-scale disruptions are rare but not unknown. East Asia suffered nearly two months of outages and slow service after an earthquake damaged undersea cables near Taiwan in December 2006. That repair operation also was hampered by bad weather.
So far, most governments in the region appeared to be operating normally, apparently because they had switched to backup satellite systems. However, the outages had caused slowdown in traffic on Dubai's stock exchange Wednesday.
In India, major outsourcing firms, such as Infosys and Wipro, and U.S. companies with significant back-office and research and development operations in India, such as IBM and Intel, said they were still trying to assess how their operations had been impacted, if at all.
But the president of the Internet Service Providers' Association of India, Rajesh Chharia, said companies that serve the East Coast of the United States and Britain had been badly hit.
"The companies that serve the (U.S.) East coast and the UK are worst affected. The delay is very bad in some cases," Chharia told The Associated Press. "They have to arrange backup plans or they have to accept the poor quality for the time being until the fiber is restored.
Chharia said some companies were rerouting their service through the Pacific route, bypassing the disrupted cables. He said roughly 50 percent of the country's bandwidth had been affected.
At the New Delhi office of Symantec Corp., a security software maker based in Cupertino, Calif., "there's definitely been a slowdown. We're able to work but the system is very slow," said Anurag Kuthiala, a system engineer.
"There's no sense of how soon the problem will be fixed," he added.
It appeared the cables had been cut north of the port city of Alexandria, and rumors in Egypt said a ship's anchor had cut them.
However, a top Egyptian telecommunications official cautioned Thursday that workers won't know for sure what caused the cuts in the cables until they are able to get repair ships and divers to the area, off the northern coast of Egypt. The official in Egypt's Ministry of Communications and Information Technology asked not to be identified because he was not authorized to speak to the media.
Rough weather and seas prevented repair ships from getting to the site Wednesday, the official said _ and it was unclear how soon they could get there.
And, even once the repair workers can arrive at the site, it could take as much as a week to repair the cable, the official said.
TeleGeography, a U.S. research group that tracks submarine cables around the world, said the Mediterranean undersea cable cuts reduced the amount of available capacity on the route from Mideast to Europe by 75 percent, and that until service was restored, many providers in Egypt and the Middle East would have to reroute their traffic around the globe, to Southeast Asia and across the Pacific and Atlantic oceans.
Alan Mauldin, research chief at the Washington-based TeleGeography, said similar outages in the future could be averted by new cable construction _ even though multiple cables could not guarantee against outages.
Mustafa Alani, head of security and terrorism department at the Dubai-based Gulf Research Center, said the outage should be a "wake-up call" for governments and professionals to divert more resources to protect vital infrastructure.
"This shows how easy it would be to attack" vital networks, such as Internet, mobile phones, he said. He was referring to the Internet, mobile phone, electronic banking and government services.
Alani said Wednesday's damage wasn't terrorism _ but it could have been. "When it comes to great technology, it's not about building it, it's how to protect it," he added.
An official at the Dubai Mercantile Exchange, Gerald David, said trading Thursday morning resumed normally following the Wednesday slowdown after which backup systems kicked in. A Mercantile spokesman said the exchange partnered with Nymex network engineering and rerouted all network traffic from Dubai trading floor to two unaffected circuits.
Saudi Telecom Company did not answer calls on Thursday, a day off in the kingdom, but the English-language Saudi newspaper Arab News said Saudi Telecom had lost more than 50 percent of its international online connectivity due to the problem.
___
Associated Press Writers Sam F. Ghattas in Beirut, Matt Rosenberg in New Delhi, India and Barbara Surk in Dubai , United Arab Emirates contributed to this report.
Associated Press Writer
First Published: 31 Jan., 2008 10:03
Cairo - Fallout spread Thursday from a cut in two undersea Internet cables off Egypt's coast, with India waking up to half of its bandwidth disrupted and widespread outages still hampering a wide swathe of the Mideast.
Officials said it could take a week or more to fix the cables, in part because of bad weather. Officials in several countries were scrambling to reroute traffic to satellites and to other cables through Asia.
In all, users in India, Pakistan, Egypt, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait and Bahrain were affected. Israel was unaffected by the outages because its Internet traffic is connected to Europe through a different undersea cable, and Lebanon and Iraq were also operating normally.
The biggest impact to the rest of the world could come from the outages across India _ where many U.S. companies outsource back-office operations including customer service call centers.
The outage also raised questions about the system's vulnerability. A Gulf analyst called it a "wake-up call" while an analyst in London cautioned that no one, including the West, was immune to such disruptions.
They could have a "massive impact on businesses," said Alex Burmaster, from Nielsen Online in London, and ordinary people "probably couldn't imagine" a life without the Internet.
Large-scale disruptions are rare but not unknown. East Asia suffered nearly two months of outages and slow service after an earthquake damaged undersea cables near Taiwan in December 2006. That repair operation also was hampered by bad weather.
So far, most governments in the region appeared to be operating normally, apparently because they had switched to backup satellite systems. However, the outages had caused slowdown in traffic on Dubai's stock exchange Wednesday.
In India, major outsourcing firms, such as Infosys and Wipro, and U.S. companies with significant back-office and research and development operations in India, such as IBM and Intel, said they were still trying to assess how their operations had been impacted, if at all.
But the president of the Internet Service Providers' Association of India, Rajesh Chharia, said companies that serve the East Coast of the United States and Britain had been badly hit.
"The companies that serve the (U.S.) East coast and the UK are worst affected. The delay is very bad in some cases," Chharia told The Associated Press. "They have to arrange backup plans or they have to accept the poor quality for the time being until the fiber is restored.
Chharia said some companies were rerouting their service through the Pacific route, bypassing the disrupted cables. He said roughly 50 percent of the country's bandwidth had been affected.
At the New Delhi office of Symantec Corp., a security software maker based in Cupertino, Calif., "there's definitely been a slowdown. We're able to work but the system is very slow," said Anurag Kuthiala, a system engineer.
"There's no sense of how soon the problem will be fixed," he added.
It appeared the cables had been cut north of the port city of Alexandria, and rumors in Egypt said a ship's anchor had cut them.
However, a top Egyptian telecommunications official cautioned Thursday that workers won't know for sure what caused the cuts in the cables until they are able to get repair ships and divers to the area, off the northern coast of Egypt. The official in Egypt's Ministry of Communications and Information Technology asked not to be identified because he was not authorized to speak to the media.
Rough weather and seas prevented repair ships from getting to the site Wednesday, the official said _ and it was unclear how soon they could get there.
And, even once the repair workers can arrive at the site, it could take as much as a week to repair the cable, the official said.
TeleGeography, a U.S. research group that tracks submarine cables around the world, said the Mediterranean undersea cable cuts reduced the amount of available capacity on the route from Mideast to Europe by 75 percent, and that until service was restored, many providers in Egypt and the Middle East would have to reroute their traffic around the globe, to Southeast Asia and across the Pacific and Atlantic oceans.
Alan Mauldin, research chief at the Washington-based TeleGeography, said similar outages in the future could be averted by new cable construction _ even though multiple cables could not guarantee against outages.
Mustafa Alani, head of security and terrorism department at the Dubai-based Gulf Research Center, said the outage should be a "wake-up call" for governments and professionals to divert more resources to protect vital infrastructure.
"This shows how easy it would be to attack" vital networks, such as Internet, mobile phones, he said. He was referring to the Internet, mobile phone, electronic banking and government services.
Alani said Wednesday's damage wasn't terrorism _ but it could have been. "When it comes to great technology, it's not about building it, it's how to protect it," he added.
An official at the Dubai Mercantile Exchange, Gerald David, said trading Thursday morning resumed normally following the Wednesday slowdown after which backup systems kicked in. A Mercantile spokesman said the exchange partnered with Nymex network engineering and rerouted all network traffic from Dubai trading floor to two unaffected circuits.
Saudi Telecom Company did not answer calls on Thursday, a day off in the kingdom, but the English-language Saudi newspaper Arab News said Saudi Telecom had lost more than 50 percent of its international online connectivity due to the problem.
___
Associated Press Writers Sam F. Ghattas in Beirut, Matt Rosenberg in New Delhi, India and Barbara Surk in Dubai , United Arab Emirates contributed to this report.
Internet outages disrupt businesses, communication across Mideast, Gulf (AP)
By Pakinam Amer
Associated Press Writer
First Published: 30 Jan., 2008 16:41
Cairo - Internet outages disrupted business and personal usage across a wide swathe of the Middle East on Wednesday after two undersea cables in the Mediterranean were damaged, government officials and Internet service providers said.
In Cairo, the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology said the cut of the international communications cables Flag and Seamewe 4 had led to a partial disruption of Internet services and other telecommunications across much of Egypt.
At the Egyptian stock market, IT department engineer Mahmoud Mansour said the disruptions did not affect the operations at the exchange.
Emergency teams were quickly trying to find alternative routes, including by satellites, to end the disruptions, said Minister Tariq Kamel. But service was still slow or nonexistent by Wednesday night.
A telecommunications expert at the Egyptian communications ministry, Rafaat Hindy, told The Associated Press that the government is "engaged in efforts to try and overcome the consequences of the problem" but cautioned that "solving this could take days."
U.S. expert Eric Schoonover, senior research analyst at TeleGeography, a Washington-based group that tracks submarine cables around the world, said the cables severed "account to 75 percent of the capacity connecting Egypt and other Middle Eastern countries to Europe.
It would take "a few days up to one week before submarine cable operators deploy ships to bring the cables up and fix the fault," Schoonover said, echoing gloomy predictions from engineers in Cairo.
Phone lines in Egypt still work, indicating "network operators in the area are rerouting traffic through emergency channels, including around India and back through Asia to the U.S. and other threshold links that can bypass that particular bottleneck," Schoonover added.
Despite this being an international cable affecting many Gulf and Arab countries, Egyptian authorities said that being closest to it, they have responsibility coordinating with companies to fix this problem. "We are working as fast as we can," Hindy said.
Internet service also was disrupted in Dubai in the United Arab Emirates in the Gulf, which markets itself as a top Mideast business and luxury tourist hub. Both Internet service providers was affected and one was completely down in the morning. DU restored Internet service by the afternoon although browsing was very slow.
The other carrier, Etisalat, and DU said international telephone service was also affected by the cable break.
DU attributed the disruption to a fault in "two international cable systems" in the Mediterranean Sea but gave no details.
It was not clear what caused the damage to the cable.
Schoonover said there was a rumor that an illegally or improperly anchored ship caused the problem, but TeleGeography cannot verify this. Cables get damaged all the time but Schoonover believes this was the first time two undersea cables next to one another in a very thin route were cut at the same time.
An official who works in the customer care department of DU, who identified himself only as Hamed because he was not authorized to talk to the media, said the cable cut took place between Alexandria, Egypt, and Palermo, Italy.
Although he was not in a position to describe the technical fault, Hamed said engineers contracted by DU were working to solve the problem. By early afternoon, the service was flooded with complaints and the ISP had found alternative routes but Hamed said "there is slowness while browsing on the Internet."
DU services Dubai media city, Internet City and Knowledge Village, which houses major university campuses.
The ISP also serves the Dubai International Financial Center (DIFC), including the Bourse, major malls, and big residential communities including the Palm Jumeira artificial island off Dubai's coast.
The deputy business editor of Khaleej Times newspaper said the overall trading volume was low at the DIFC due to a sharp drop of on-line trading.
"There was a drop in the trading activity," said Issac John, although he was not sure it was entirely due to the Internet problems.
Wednesday's trade volume amounted to nearly US$330 million, which is well short of closer to US$1 billion on a good day.
There was no total outage in Kuwait, but service was interrupted Tuesday and Wednesday. The Gulfnet International Company apologized in an e-mail Wednesday to its customers for the "degraded performance in Internet browsing," which it said was caused by a cable cut in the Mediterranean.
In Saudi Arabia, some users said Internet was functioning fine but others said it was slow or totally down.
A staffer at a Saudi ISP said that they were told that a cable rupture was the cause of the problem, which began early Wednesday. He spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media. Calls to Saudi Telecom went unanswered Wednesday afternoon, the start of the weekend in Saudi Arabia.
Users in Bahrain and Qatar also complained of slow Internet.
Associated Press Writer
First Published: 30 Jan., 2008 16:41
Cairo - Internet outages disrupted business and personal usage across a wide swathe of the Middle East on Wednesday after two undersea cables in the Mediterranean were damaged, government officials and Internet service providers said.
In Cairo, the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology said the cut of the international communications cables Flag and Seamewe 4 had led to a partial disruption of Internet services and other telecommunications across much of Egypt.
At the Egyptian stock market, IT department engineer Mahmoud Mansour said the disruptions did not affect the operations at the exchange.
Emergency teams were quickly trying to find alternative routes, including by satellites, to end the disruptions, said Minister Tariq Kamel. But service was still slow or nonexistent by Wednesday night.
A telecommunications expert at the Egyptian communications ministry, Rafaat Hindy, told The Associated Press that the government is "engaged in efforts to try and overcome the consequences of the problem" but cautioned that "solving this could take days."
U.S. expert Eric Schoonover, senior research analyst at TeleGeography, a Washington-based group that tracks submarine cables around the world, said the cables severed "account to 75 percent of the capacity connecting Egypt and other Middle Eastern countries to Europe.
It would take "a few days up to one week before submarine cable operators deploy ships to bring the cables up and fix the fault," Schoonover said, echoing gloomy predictions from engineers in Cairo.
Phone lines in Egypt still work, indicating "network operators in the area are rerouting traffic through emergency channels, including around India and back through Asia to the U.S. and other threshold links that can bypass that particular bottleneck," Schoonover added.
Despite this being an international cable affecting many Gulf and Arab countries, Egyptian authorities said that being closest to it, they have responsibility coordinating with companies to fix this problem. "We are working as fast as we can," Hindy said.
Internet service also was disrupted in Dubai in the United Arab Emirates in the Gulf, which markets itself as a top Mideast business and luxury tourist hub. Both Internet service providers was affected and one was completely down in the morning. DU restored Internet service by the afternoon although browsing was very slow.
The other carrier, Etisalat, and DU said international telephone service was also affected by the cable break.
DU attributed the disruption to a fault in "two international cable systems" in the Mediterranean Sea but gave no details.
It was not clear what caused the damage to the cable.
Schoonover said there was a rumor that an illegally or improperly anchored ship caused the problem, but TeleGeography cannot verify this. Cables get damaged all the time but Schoonover believes this was the first time two undersea cables next to one another in a very thin route were cut at the same time.
An official who works in the customer care department of DU, who identified himself only as Hamed because he was not authorized to talk to the media, said the cable cut took place between Alexandria, Egypt, and Palermo, Italy.
Although he was not in a position to describe the technical fault, Hamed said engineers contracted by DU were working to solve the problem. By early afternoon, the service was flooded with complaints and the ISP had found alternative routes but Hamed said "there is slowness while browsing on the Internet."
DU services Dubai media city, Internet City and Knowledge Village, which houses major university campuses.
The ISP also serves the Dubai International Financial Center (DIFC), including the Bourse, major malls, and big residential communities including the Palm Jumeira artificial island off Dubai's coast.
The deputy business editor of Khaleej Times newspaper said the overall trading volume was low at the DIFC due to a sharp drop of on-line trading.
"There was a drop in the trading activity," said Issac John, although he was not sure it was entirely due to the Internet problems.
Wednesday's trade volume amounted to nearly US$330 million, which is well short of closer to US$1 billion on a good day.
There was no total outage in Kuwait, but service was interrupted Tuesday and Wednesday. The Gulfnet International Company apologized in an e-mail Wednesday to its customers for the "degraded performance in Internet browsing," which it said was caused by a cable cut in the Mediterranean.
In Saudi Arabia, some users said Internet was functioning fine but others said it was slow or totally down.
A staffer at a Saudi ISP said that they were told that a cable rupture was the cause of the problem, which began early Wednesday. He spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media. Calls to Saudi Telecom went unanswered Wednesday afternoon, the start of the weekend in Saudi Arabia.
Users in Bahrain and Qatar also complained of slow Internet.
Saturday, January 26, 2008
Mubarak offers to broker talks between Hamas and Fatah - AP
Jan 25, 2008 23:26 Updated Jan 26, 2008 0:13By Pakinam Amer
ASSOCIATED PRESS
CAIRO, Egypt
Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak offered on Friday to host talks between rival Palestinian Fatah and Hamas leaders, in an apparent effort to raise his country's role as Mideast peace broker and ease the pressure following Gaza Palestinian influx into Egypt from the Hamas-controlled strip.
In an interview for Saturday's edition of the Egyptian weekly al-Osboa, Mubarak said he wants peace between the Palestinians.
"I want this language of violence to stop," Mubarak was quoted as saying by the state MENA news agency. "Peace could be achieved on the basis of international resolutions and agreements that demand the establishment of Palestinian state."
Hamas appeared eager to accept the offer.
Ayman Taha, Hamas spokesman in Gaza, told the pan-Arab Al-Jazeera TV that Hamas's supreme leader, the Syria-based Khaled Mashaal, was ready to accept Mubarak's invitation to an "unconditional dialogue."
"We as Hamas have nothing against sitting in Egypt for dialogue and to end all our differences with our brothers in Fatah," Taha told Al-Arabiya, another pan-Arab satellite channel.
But Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas's representative in Egypt, Nabil Shaath told The Associated Press that Fatah has made no decision on the invitation.
Abbas's position was clear, Shaath said: Fatah was "always ready for dialogue," but what was important was the result of such talks. And a result cannot be achieved "unless Hamas announces its readiness to let go of military control" of Gaza, he said.
Shaath also said Abbas will head to Egypt after meeting with Prime Minister Ehud Olmert on Sunday and would talk more here about Mubarak's offer.
Mubarak's offer came as Egypt is enduring an influx of hundreds of thousands of Gazans through its border with Gaza Strip since Wednesday, when Hamas members blew up segments of the border wall separating the area from Egypt.
The breach climaxed a week of Gazans' discontent after Israel imposed a blockade on the Strip, stopping shipments of fuel, medicine and food. Israel has also been carrying out air strikes and limited ground operations against Gazan terrorists who are launching attacks on Israel.
Egypt has failed to stem the flow of Gazans or manage the chaotic border situation, despite deploying reinforcement. Egypt has long feared the instability in the Hamas-controlled Gaza could spill over into Egypt, and has been distancing itself from Hamas. The last time Hamas and Fatah met for talks in Cairo was in Feb. 2005.
Earlier this month, Hamas Premier Ismail Haniyeh in Gaza called for talks with Egypt and Fatah, to work out a new shared arrangement for Gaza's border crossings. At the time, Haniyeh suggested Hamas would be prepared to cede some control to the Abbas government in the West Bank.
In Syria Friday, radical Palestinian factions called on the two rival Palestinian groups to begin dialogue and end their power struggle. A statement at the end of the three-day National Palestinian Conference of factions opposed to peace with Israel stressed the need for Palestinians to unite in the face of the worsening Gaza situation, which they ascribed to Israel's siege.
Dialogue is the "only way to solve inter-Palestinian differences," the groups said.
LINK: http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1201070794077&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2008/01/25/africa/ME-GEN-Egypt-Palestinians-Talks.php
Thursday, January 24, 2008
Egypt arrests Muslim Brotherhood to stop Gaza protests - AP
By Pakinam AmerAssociated Press Writer
2008-01-23 16:28:37 -
CAIRO, Egypt (AP) - Egyptian police have arrested at least 460 members of the opposition Muslim Brotherhood, including leading figures, in their attempt to thwart a planned demonstration in protest of Israel's blockade of the Hamas-controlled Gaza strip, security officials said Wednesday.
The demonstration was scheduled to take place in front of the Arab League's headquarters in downtown Cairo by noon, and was expected to attract hundreds of political activists and members of the banned Islamic group.
Muslim Brotherhood members from across different provinces, mainly the oasis city of Fayoum and the Mediterranean port city of Alexandria, have been flocking to the capital to join members of their brethren since the early hours Wednesday, according to a security official. He spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk to the press.
However, their attempt to reach the protest site was prevented by security forces who dispersed the walking crowds by force and detained at least 300 of the activists in Cairo alone. Police also arrested a total of 160 others in metro and train stations outside of the capital or when they were about to get into their vehicles and heading to Cairo.
A statement from the Brotherhood said their members, would-be-protesters, were held back by riot police and beaten by batons and heavy clubs. Five lawmakers among them were surrounded by police and were continuously badmouthed, the statement said.
Brotherhood leader Mohammed Mahdi Akef described the arrests as «an embarrassment, a disgrace» and called on authorities to end this «unfair campaign» and immediately release the group members.
He ascribed the sudden flurry of arrests to rising «popular support for lifting the blockade on Gaza and opening the crossing points in Rafah to assuage the suffering of the Palestinian people.
Some 64 members were arrested from Alexandria, including leading member Ali Abdel Fattah, 16 from Cairo's twin city of Giza, 52 from Fayoum and the rest from elsewhere in the Nile Delta, security officials said.
Brotherhood lawyer Abdel Moneim Abdel Maqsoud told The Associated Press that so far, 380 members of the organization have been arrested in Cairo in connection with protests over the situation in Gaza.
The group has been urging the Egyptian government to reopen the closed border crossings with Gaza for humanitarian aid to the Palestinians in Gaza. Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak announced on Wednesday that he had ordered his troops to allow the Palestinians into Egypt to buy food in Rafah after thousands broke through the border.
Earlier in the day, around a thousand Cairo University students, including many affiliated with the Brotherhood, held a rally on campus in support of the Gaza Palestinians despite Mubarak's move to allow Palestinians to cross into Egypt because they were starving.
Damietta, north of Cairo, witnessed another Gaza-related demonstration of around 3000 activists _ mostly Brotherhood members. Twelve organizers were arrested, security officials said.
The Brotherhood, founded 1928, but officially banned since in 1954, is Egypt's largest opposition group with its lawmakers, who run as independents, holding just over a fifth of the seats in the 454-member lower house of the parliament.
Link: http://www.pr-inside.com/egypt-arrests-muslim-brotherhood-to-r400530.htm
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3497959,00.html
Thursday, January 17, 2008
Al-Jazeera: US Fails to Isolate Iran from Arabs
By Pakinam Amer in CairoGeorge Bush, the US president, has urged Arab states to think of Iran as the greatest threat to their security, but his warnings are likely to fall on deaf ears in the Middle East.
During a stop in the United Arab Emirates on his Middle East tour on Sunday, Bush called Tehran a "sponsor of terror" and urged Arab allies to confront Iranian "extremism".
But Middle East analysts say the US president is too late as key American allies in the Arab world have thrown their weight behind a growing rapprochement with Iran.
Seyed Mohammad Marandi, a political analyst and professor of political science at Tehran University, said American fumbling in the Middle East has pushed Arabs to adopt dialogue with the Islamic Republic.
He said: "America's wrong policies in the Middle East have ironically helped Iran's voice be heard more clearly, as well as Iran's political prudence that has kept it away from the conflicts in the area.
"At this moment in time, the United States' popularity is at its lowest level among the people all over the Arab world, and Iran's popularity has grown immensely as the only regional power standing against the United States in the same region."
Unprecedented moves
For most of 2007, the US tried to push through a UN resolution to impose economic sanctions on Iran if it did not halt its alleged nuclear weapons programme.
But Washington failed in its bid to isolate Iran in the Middle East.
Not only did its Arab allies reject a punitive US military strike against Iran, but they were also keen on bolstering their own ties with the country.
The members of the Gulf Co-operation Council countries invited Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Iran's president, to attend their annual meeting held in Doha, Qatar last December while Egypt engaged in shuttle diplomacy of its own with Tehran.
Often contentious issues between Iran and its neighbours, such as a string of disputed islands bordering the United Arab Emirates, were shelved for later "dialogue" in favour of building trust and rapprochement.
Weeks later, King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia invited Ahmadinejad to perform the Hajj in Mecca.
Even Egypt has been keen on extending a friendly hand towards Iran. For the first time in 27 years, the two countries are discussing the possibility of renewing diplomatic relations and reopening Tehran's embassy in Cairo.
In 1980, Tehran cut off ties when Anwar Sadat, then Egyptian president, hosted Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi, the deposed Shah of Iran.
Iran also blamed Egypt for supporting its enemy during the eight-year Iran-Iraq war.
But last week, Ahmadinejad told Iranian television that if Egypt decided to restore full diplomatic ties, he would "put the new Iranian ambassador on the next plane to Cairo".
Street name changed
Iran also caved in to Egyptian demands and recently changed the name of a Tehran street honouring Khaled el-Islamboli, the man who assassinated Sadat.
Fahmy Howeidy, an Egyptian scholar and expert on Iran, believes recent conflicts, including the Iraq war, have elevated Tehran's importance in the region.
"For one, no one can talk about the Iraqi file without mentioning Iran. Iran is also involved in the Lebanese and Afghani files [and] it has connections with the Syrians, the Palestinians. Thus, if anyone wants to reach a settlement in the region, he should approach Iran," he told Al Jazeera.
Mustafa Bakri, an Egyptian MP and opposition journalist, agrees.
He said: "In the coming period, Iran will play a significant role in the Gulf regional security, perhaps even with the undeclared consent of the international powers.
"At the same time, the Gulf countries would seek to assure Iran that their lands will not be a base from which any war against it will be launched."
Mohammad Ali Hosseini, Iran's foreign ministry spokesman, earlier said that existing relations between Iran and its Arab neighbours should be strengthened.
He said: "We believe the stronger the ties get, the more stability, peace and security the Persian Gulf region will enjoy and that is a crucial necessity needed by both Iran and its neighbours in the region."
Marandi believes that the normalisation of Arab ties with Iran also plays to domestic consumption.
"It's despite US pressure that Arab countries are extending a friendly hand towards Iran," he said.
"The reality is that a lot of the Arab regimes have always been very close to the United States and some of them have been dependent on the United States.
"It's for the benefits of these governments to strengthen ties with the Iranian government and be seen as independent."
"It's for the benefits of these governments to strengthen ties with the Iranian government and be seen as independent."
Role in Iraq
In Iraq, Iranian influence - and involvement - is becoming pivotal to stabilising the country, five years after the US-led invasion that toppled the Saddam Hussein government.
In late January, US and Iranian representatives are expected to sit for a fourth round of discussions over Iraq's security.
Ahead of the talks, US generals who once accused Iran of arming and training Shia death squads, conceded that Iran has a constructive role to play in Iraq by curbing arms and fighters from crossing the border.
Hussein Hafez, a political science professor at Baghdad University, said the US has tried to isolate Iraqi Shias from Iran since 2003.
He said: "Iraq's Shia society is an integral element in the architecture of America's tie-up with Iran and vice versa. Iran is a major and influential state in the region. It is not possible any more for the American think-tanks and decision-makers to deal so naively and simply with a state like Iran."
Hafez says Tehran's ongoing support for Shia militias, which he believes undermine US efforts in Iraq, make US-Iran negotiations "inevitable".
"The Iranian-US dialogue in so many ways reminds me of the US foreign policy shift before its complete defeat in Vietnam; back then,the American strategy experts had noted that the US administration had changed its policies towards the countries of south-east Asia."
However, Iraq is unlikely to benefit from US-Iran talks, he said.
"Unfortunately, the US does not care about the interests of any of Iraq's factions. It is its own interests that it serves."
"Unfortunately, the US does not care about the interests of any of Iraq's factions. It is its own interests that it serves."
Cautious steps
While the threat of war between the US and Iran has significantly subsided since a National Intelligence Estimate report said Tehran halted its nuclear weapons programme in 2003, tensions remain high.
Bush's Iran terror warning earlier this week was preceded by a showdown between Iranian gunboats and US warships in the Gulf.
Iranians say such brinkmanship and speeches means that Tehran still distrusts Washington's intentions and is waiting for the US elections for any signs of a shift in strategy.
"Iran is wary of the US policy change," says Marandi in Tehran.
"I don't think that the Iranians really believe that this [US] administration has shifted its policy towards Iran and I think that they are waiting to see what the next administration will do."
"I don't think that the Iranians really believe that this [US] administration has shifted its policy towards Iran and I think that they are waiting to see what the next administration will do."
With additional reporting by Doha Al Zohairy in Cairo and Alireza Ronaghi, Al Jazeera's Iran correspondent.
Link to the article: http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/5620B788-6455-4C5C-A7D5-9A3CC917517D.htm
In-depth timeline - Iran and Arabs: http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/BECB3E7C-0E40-45DE-9FEF-FB25A97423CF.htm
In Egypt, unrest will spill over into 2008 - dpa
By Pakinam AmerDec. 18, 2007
Cairo (dpa) - In the last few months of 2007, Egypt has experienced a series of massive workers strikes, motivated by none other than poor standards of living and lack of privileges, foreboding the beginning of a possible "uprising" by Egypt‘s poor.
But an angry struggle against deteriorating economic conditions is not the only source of concern for many Egyptian analysts. "Political oppression" is another and as the year ends, pro-democracy activists say that they are as worried as ever about Egypt‘s political future.
"Inevitably the country‘s political struggles will spill over into the coming year," says legal expert and human rights activist Hafez Abu Saada.
Against the backdrop of economic problems and amid tensions created by a political war between banned Islamist movements like theMuslim Brotherhood and the ruling powers, observers are predicting that the coming year will be equally dominated by both pro-democracy activity and workforce riots.
Egypt should expect more signs of the coming of "a revolution of the hungry" not unlike the bread riots that occurred during the rule of former president Anwar al-Sadat, one newspaper columnist wrote.
The expression "revolution of the hungry" was coined by opposition columnists to describe an aggressive resistance to stringent pro-capitalist economic policies, privatization being a common example, that stomp on the rights of underprivileged Egyptians in favour of the well-to-do.
For these columnists, the "resistance" was clear in September‘s week-long strike of 27,000 Egyptian workers over low wages and overdue benefits in northern Gharbiya province.
In the eyes of observers, the protests signaled the birth of a new front of opposition to the government.
At one point, the workers took control of one of the state‘s biggest mills and threatened to overthrow its administration. The state had to bow to their demands when attempts to quell the workers‘ protests by force had promised to be disastrous.
The workers protests were coupled with the controversy over the food subsidy policy with government cancelling food ration coupons for "undeserving" citizens and increasing prices of some subsidized goods.
The policy was enacted in the 1960s and has encompassed basic food items like flour, oil, rice, and sugar. Wheat is also subsidized, and in turn bread whose quality is less than mediocre but relatively affordable for many Egyptians.
A very common sight in the streets is the morning bread queues, so the notion of making bread more expensive has already driven many otherwise passive Egyptians to speak out in a struggle for the last remnant of government assistance.
"In addition, privatization continues to throw more people to the streets, while early retirement (policies) lay off workers and leave them with a monthly allowance that barely makes ends meet," said Abu Saada.
This kind of proletariat opposition is not political, says Malek Moustafa, one of Egypt‘s prominent political bloggers: "Hunger is what has driven these people to the streets."
Moustafa also believes that protests for civil liberties and political freedom will continue unabated but will not be as influential, "especially in the absence of the US as a supporter."
In late 2006 and more so in 2007, the United States support for political reform in Egypt has faltered. Egypt remains the second-biggest recipient of US aid in the world. And although cutting down the aid was a demand of many "angry" activists inside Egypt, most analysts believe that the possibility is far-fetched.
The Hamas experience in the nearby Gaza Strip made the likelihood of Islamists coming to power in Egypt if free elections were to beheld a scary prospect for both the US and the international community, observers feel. Thus, the US has found itself compelled to support authoritarian regimes like Mubarak‘s, says Abu Saada.
Once the country‘s most outspoken movement, the Kifaya (Enough) group has withdrew from the political scene as well, amid reports of rifts among its own ranks. And despite trying to initiate a "civil disobedience" campaign last July in order to protest the government‘s domestic policies, the group‘s activity has become feeble in 2007.
Adding to the tension-filled atmosphere is the flurry regarding human rights violations. Reports of torture in prisons and abrupt, unjustified detentions are flying around while a crackdown on dissident members of the press continued fiercely.
"No one expects 2008 to be a better year," says Abu Saada. "We expect more chains (on freedoms), more (political) oppression and more repression of the country‘s poor."
© 2006 dpa - Deutsche Presse-Agentur
Link: http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/160545.html
Iraq's refugee writers scramble for a living in Egypt - dpa
By Pakinam Amer
Dec. 17, 2007
Cairo (dpa) - Iraqi writers and journalists exiled abroad owing to the poor security situation in their native country are facing the prospect of having to return home to "save face" because of dwindling finances and poor security prospects, many say.
"People are returning because they‘re running out of money. The alternative is to extend your hand out and beg," says Alia Taleb, a female writer and the former managing editor of a Baghdad-based newspaper.
"But an Iraqi would rather die in his land then beg for money in a foreign country. Iraqis return so that they won‘t be stripped of their pride and dignity," added Taleb, who left Baghdad more than a year earlier.
Recently, reports of relative stability in Baghdad had encouraged many to return, especially those without enough financial resources.
The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), has however warned Iraqis against returning home, insisting that the country still suffers from lack of security and services. In additiona UN survey has revealed that two-thirds of those who returned found their homes occupied and so became displaced again.
Like other Iraqi refugees, the writers and journalists exiled in Egypt have accommodation problems because of strict visa rules endorsed to control the flow of asylum-seekers into the country.
According to the UN refugees‘ body, one out of eight Iraqis have left their country - the largest long-term movement since the displacement of the Palestinians in 1948.
In Egypt alone, a country rife with poverty and with more than 79 million inhabitants mostly concentrated in Cairo and around the Nile delta, at least 80,000 Iraqis have arrived since the 2003 US invasion of Iraq.
Taleb is one Iraqi who knows she has no life back in Baghdad. She used to have a small parcel of land that she sold in order to be able to find a relatively comfortable home in Cairo.
"What do you think made us leave behind our heritage, let our life‘s achievements turn to ashes? We left all this behind our backs because of our children, to give them life," Taleb tells Deustche Presse-Agentur dpa.
"We can‘t find a place in any country, not here or Syria or Jordan. But the alternative is death," she says, noting that more than 125 journalists have been killed so far in the war-scarred country.
"As journalists, we are targets for all the power-strugglers in the country," she says.
But it‘s not only the fear of death that made Iraqi artists, journalists and writers leave their homes, relatives and memories behind. "And it‘s not just fear of death that holds us from returning," Taleb says.
For many independent women like Taleb, it is the notion of being killed "without cause," for example for wearing the wrong clothes or bearing the wrong allegiance.
"It is very likely that a woman in Iraq is killed for such petty reasons. If she works in media, she then becomes a direct target for militants.
"I would hate to die at the hands of a nobody who would just shoot me for the way I dress, for not covering my hair or because I drive a car," adds Taleb, who does not wear the headscarf worn by many Muslim women across Arab states. Women in Iraq are victims of crimes, explosions, sexual assaults, random and targeted shootings, according to Taleb.
"They kidnap women and girls in Iraq. They rape them. They take them hostages for ransom money," says Taleb. "I‘d rather die than see one of my daughters suffer any of these things."
Taleb, like other stranded Iraqi writers, does not have a stable or well-paying job and can barely make ends meet through freelancing and temporary assignments.
"The money is running out. I spent 35,000 dollars in the past year alone," she says. "Many editors-in-chief, writers, senior journalists who I used to know back in Baghdad are here in Egypt. They are all without jobs now.
"And we‘re not young any more. We had high positions in our country. I was a managing editor in my homeland, I would never accept to do small jobs again.
"But how much longer can I struggle?"
© 2006 dpa - Deutsche Presse-Agentur
Dec. 17, 2007
Cairo (dpa) - Iraqi writers and journalists exiled abroad owing to the poor security situation in their native country are facing the prospect of having to return home to "save face" because of dwindling finances and poor security prospects, many say.
"People are returning because they‘re running out of money. The alternative is to extend your hand out and beg," says Alia Taleb, a female writer and the former managing editor of a Baghdad-based newspaper.
"But an Iraqi would rather die in his land then beg for money in a foreign country. Iraqis return so that they won‘t be stripped of their pride and dignity," added Taleb, who left Baghdad more than a year earlier.
Recently, reports of relative stability in Baghdad had encouraged many to return, especially those without enough financial resources.
The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), has however warned Iraqis against returning home, insisting that the country still suffers from lack of security and services. In additiona UN survey has revealed that two-thirds of those who returned found their homes occupied and so became displaced again.
Like other Iraqi refugees, the writers and journalists exiled in Egypt have accommodation problems because of strict visa rules endorsed to control the flow of asylum-seekers into the country.
According to the UN refugees‘ body, one out of eight Iraqis have left their country - the largest long-term movement since the displacement of the Palestinians in 1948.
In Egypt alone, a country rife with poverty and with more than 79 million inhabitants mostly concentrated in Cairo and around the Nile delta, at least 80,000 Iraqis have arrived since the 2003 US invasion of Iraq.
Taleb is one Iraqi who knows she has no life back in Baghdad. She used to have a small parcel of land that she sold in order to be able to find a relatively comfortable home in Cairo.
"What do you think made us leave behind our heritage, let our life‘s achievements turn to ashes? We left all this behind our backs because of our children, to give them life," Taleb tells Deustche Presse-Agentur dpa.
"We can‘t find a place in any country, not here or Syria or Jordan. But the alternative is death," she says, noting that more than 125 journalists have been killed so far in the war-scarred country.
"As journalists, we are targets for all the power-strugglers in the country," she says.
But it‘s not only the fear of death that made Iraqi artists, journalists and writers leave their homes, relatives and memories behind. "And it‘s not just fear of death that holds us from returning," Taleb says.
For many independent women like Taleb, it is the notion of being killed "without cause," for example for wearing the wrong clothes or bearing the wrong allegiance.
"It is very likely that a woman in Iraq is killed for such petty reasons. If she works in media, she then becomes a direct target for militants.
"I would hate to die at the hands of a nobody who would just shoot me for the way I dress, for not covering my hair or because I drive a car," adds Taleb, who does not wear the headscarf worn by many Muslim women across Arab states. Women in Iraq are victims of crimes, explosions, sexual assaults, random and targeted shootings, according to Taleb.
"They kidnap women and girls in Iraq. They rape them. They take them hostages for ransom money," says Taleb. "I‘d rather die than see one of my daughters suffer any of these things."
Taleb, like other stranded Iraqi writers, does not have a stable or well-paying job and can barely make ends meet through freelancing and temporary assignments.
"The money is running out. I spent 35,000 dollars in the past year alone," she says. "Many editors-in-chief, writers, senior journalists who I used to know back in Baghdad are here in Egypt. They are all without jobs now.
"And we‘re not young any more. We had high positions in our country. I was a managing editor in my homeland, I would never accept to do small jobs again.
"But how much longer can I struggle?"
© 2006 dpa - Deutsche Presse-Agentur
Friday, December 07, 2007
Egyptian workers begin 'indefinite' strike, picket cabinet - dpa
By Pakinam Amer
Dec 5, 2007, 19:29 GMT
Cairo - Protesting round the clock in front of the cabinet's headquarters for the third day in a row, Egyptian tax workers said they had reached a dead end and so had nothing left to lose.
'We could be dismissed from work, we could be imprisoned or beaten up by security police, but we don't care any more,' one of the workers shouted on Wednesday.
The Egyptians - some middle-aged and some elderly - said they would begin a hunger strike Thursday morning if their suffering was further ignored.
'We fear nothing. We just want our rights back,' a protestor cried out.
Metres away stood rows of heavily-armed riot police, while truckloads of standby forces could be seen parked in the vicinity. Security personnel ordered that metal cordons be placed around the throngs of workers, but so far no clashes with police had been reported.
The state employees, who are all members of the property tax department, have been picketing for better wages and working conditions since October when they initially organized a mass strike of around 55,000 tax workers.
This week's picket brought together around 500 employees from both southern and northern provinces.
The protestors, standing by the gates of the cabinet quarters in downtown Cairo, will not collect any taxes until their demands are met.
Suleiman Rashed, from Giza's tax division, said he had been working in the state-run institution for more than 25 years and his salary had only reached 450 Egyptian pounds (81 dollars) a month.
An accountant in the same department, Gamal Hassanein, claimed his net income was 380 pounds (69 dollars). 'A state employee taking only this much? Imagine,' he said.
'Sometimes, they deduct 50 per cent of our efforts benefits because we do not meet the desired tax collection quota,' Rashed told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa.
The tax collectors usually face difficulties during money collection.
'Some people refuse to pay, and we follow them around. But sometimes, we fail to collect. What do we do then? Shoot the citizen (who refuses to pay)?' Rashed shouted at the top of his voice.
'I work in the countryside collecting taxes from farmers, and we face a lot of dangers there too. We are beaten up sometimes, and others are even shot when they pursue the farmers for payment,' a tax collector from Monofiyah province agreed.
On the protest site, it is clear that workers have lost patience with both their union and government.
Calling the finance minister, the labour union head and even members of the cabinet 'liars, scoundrels and thieves,' the protestors said they stood alone: 'Poor, hungry and no better than beggars.'
So far, leaders of the strike say the government has not been responsive to their movement, and demands that they be treated like their colleagues in departments run by the Ministry of Finance have not been met.
According to the workers, a recent move by the government has caused the reassignment of the tax department workers.
The senior and high-ranking tax employees became answerable to the Ministry of Finance, receiving higher incomes and yearly benefits. Others were placed under locality governance. 'These are the ones who do not have enough connections,' claimed one of the workers.
The angry protestors want the discrepancies in wages between employees to be eliminated. The labour union earlier deemed the workers' pleas legitimate but refused to back up their strike.
Hussein Mugawer, head of the labour union, told al-Masri al-Yom newspaper earlier that 'a strike will complicate ongoing negotiations (with the government). The policy of arm-twisting that the workers are following will not work.'
'Mugawer claimed he had talks with the (finance) minister. But we know he didn't. They all ignore us,' Rashed said.
'They have no hearts, no children or wives or parents,' another protestor said, describing how 'inhuman' he believed the authorities were. 'We are spending our days here on the bare pavement and they feel nothing for us. Where is the mercy?'
In some provinces, workers told dpa that state security personnel had given them orders not to strike or join their fellow workers in Cairo. Some had still travelled to the Egyptian capital to join the larger protest despite the ban.
'Once we speak out back at work, they threaten us with dismissal and relocation,' a protestor said.
© 2007 dpa - Deutsche Presse-Agentur
Link: http://news.monstersandcritics.com/business/features/article_1378893.php/Egyptian_workers_begin_indefinite_strike_picket_cabinet
Dec 5, 2007, 19:29 GMT
Cairo - Protesting round the clock in front of the cabinet's headquarters for the third day in a row, Egyptian tax workers said they had reached a dead end and so had nothing left to lose.
'We could be dismissed from work, we could be imprisoned or beaten up by security police, but we don't care any more,' one of the workers shouted on Wednesday.
The Egyptians - some middle-aged and some elderly - said they would begin a hunger strike Thursday morning if their suffering was further ignored.
'We fear nothing. We just want our rights back,' a protestor cried out.
Metres away stood rows of heavily-armed riot police, while truckloads of standby forces could be seen parked in the vicinity. Security personnel ordered that metal cordons be placed around the throngs of workers, but so far no clashes with police had been reported.
The state employees, who are all members of the property tax department, have been picketing for better wages and working conditions since October when they initially organized a mass strike of around 55,000 tax workers.
This week's picket brought together around 500 employees from both southern and northern provinces.
The protestors, standing by the gates of the cabinet quarters in downtown Cairo, will not collect any taxes until their demands are met.
Suleiman Rashed, from Giza's tax division, said he had been working in the state-run institution for more than 25 years and his salary had only reached 450 Egyptian pounds (81 dollars) a month.
An accountant in the same department, Gamal Hassanein, claimed his net income was 380 pounds (69 dollars). 'A state employee taking only this much? Imagine,' he said.
'Sometimes, they deduct 50 per cent of our efforts benefits because we do not meet the desired tax collection quota,' Rashed told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa.
The tax collectors usually face difficulties during money collection.
'Some people refuse to pay, and we follow them around. But sometimes, we fail to collect. What do we do then? Shoot the citizen (who refuses to pay)?' Rashed shouted at the top of his voice.
'I work in the countryside collecting taxes from farmers, and we face a lot of dangers there too. We are beaten up sometimes, and others are even shot when they pursue the farmers for payment,' a tax collector from Monofiyah province agreed.
On the protest site, it is clear that workers have lost patience with both their union and government.
Calling the finance minister, the labour union head and even members of the cabinet 'liars, scoundrels and thieves,' the protestors said they stood alone: 'Poor, hungry and no better than beggars.'
So far, leaders of the strike say the government has not been responsive to their movement, and demands that they be treated like their colleagues in departments run by the Ministry of Finance have not been met.
According to the workers, a recent move by the government has caused the reassignment of the tax department workers.
The senior and high-ranking tax employees became answerable to the Ministry of Finance, receiving higher incomes and yearly benefits. Others were placed under locality governance. 'These are the ones who do not have enough connections,' claimed one of the workers.
The angry protestors want the discrepancies in wages between employees to be eliminated. The labour union earlier deemed the workers' pleas legitimate but refused to back up their strike.
Hussein Mugawer, head of the labour union, told al-Masri al-Yom newspaper earlier that 'a strike will complicate ongoing negotiations (with the government). The policy of arm-twisting that the workers are following will not work.'
'Mugawer claimed he had talks with the (finance) minister. But we know he didn't. They all ignore us,' Rashed said.
'They have no hearts, no children or wives or parents,' another protestor said, describing how 'inhuman' he believed the authorities were. 'We are spending our days here on the bare pavement and they feel nothing for us. Where is the mercy?'
In some provinces, workers told dpa that state security personnel had given them orders not to strike or join their fellow workers in Cairo. Some had still travelled to the Egyptian capital to join the larger protest despite the ban.
'Once we speak out back at work, they threaten us with dismissal and relocation,' a protestor said.
© 2007 dpa - Deutsche Presse-Agentur
Link: http://news.monstersandcritics.com/business/features/article_1378893.php/Egyptian_workers_begin_indefinite_strike_picket_cabinet
UN climate report carries warning for Arab states - dpa
By Pakinam Amer
Dec 5, 2007, 19:28 GMT
Cairo - Warnings against human-induced climate change resulting from greenhouse gas emissions, scarce and strained water resources, lack of food security and deteriorating human health dominated the United Nation Development Programme's newest report.
Launched in the Egypt-based League of Arab nations during an Arab environment and development ministers meeting, the UNDP's Human Development Report for 2007/2008, labelled Fighting climate change: Human solidarity in a divided world, called for collective and immediate action and warned against pessimism.
'Confronted with a problem as daunting as climate change, resigned pessimism might seem a justified response,' read the report. 'However, resigned pessimism is a luxury that the world's poor and future generations cannot afford - and there is an alternative.'
The first step lies in taking adaptive measures to climate change, unique to each countries' conditions, said the report.
The Arab world, like other regions, contributes to 'deep carbon footprints' with Egypt having some of the highest levels of carbon emissions globally.
Already, the north African country is threatened by climate shocks like floods that lessen longterm opportunities for human development. In Egypt, as in other developing counties of the Arab world, many of the poor depend on natural resources for their livelihood.
However, erosion of the coast of the Nile Delta, pollution, and salinization are affecting agricultural productivity and in turn could lead to possible loss of land.
'The evidence of climate change is there and the change will get worse. You find it in shortage of water in areas that are already short of water, like the Arab areas and Egypt,' said Mohammed al- Ashry, UNDP official and co-author of the report.
Al-Ashry told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa that the report sheds light on the percentages of the decrease of water availability in Syria, Lebanon and Egypt, mainly the Nile Delta.
Concerning Egypt, the sea level changes are causing a threat to the northern Nile Delta especially, he said.
'If you have one metre decrease in sea level then you are going to lose more than 4,500 square kilometres of the delta and around six million people will need to be relocated,' al-Ashry told dpa. Agricultural production would also be affected.
The regional report addresses the people, according to the UNDP official, and the poor in Egypt and the Arab world are suffering the most from climate change.
The report concludes that the 'expenditure on social affairs is very low for the Arab world,' said al-Ashry where the most underprivileged are those 'people who are living in work areas and suburbs.'
It's the human development aspects that Egypt and the Arab countries should focus on, from education to health care and nutrition efforts, he said.
The Arab world needs to strengthen social safety net programmes, according to report recommendations. The region is reluctant to make any tangible efforts to change the status quo; leaning instead on claims of gradual efforts, say observers.
'Everyone is talking about a gradual effort to combat climate change with time markers such as 2020, 2030 and 2050, (but) top scientists believe that the climate change will be both sudden and severe,' said al-Ashry.
In November's summit of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), member states, including Arab nations, stressed their commitment to fighting global warming and harmful environmental changes.
However, the UNDP official believes that these counties want to appear more cooperative through giving 750-million-dollar funds which are 'a drop in the bucket with the price of oil as it is,' approaching the 100-dollar-a-barrel mark.
'OPEC, I don't actually believe for a moment that they think about climate change. They are producing climate change,' said al-Ashry.
'Some of them are concerned that reducing gas emissions would mean energy efficiency, alternative energy sources, renewable energy, perhaps even nuclear (energy), and in turn cutting down on use of oil.'
'This is utter nonsense; oil will always be important and will be used. But this is a very defensive approach on their part.'
The solution? 'The combat against climate change has to be part of the economic thinking of the country, preparing strategies for human and economic development putting in mind climate change,' al-Ashry told dpa.
© 2007 dpa - Deutsche Presse-Agentur
Link: http://news.monstersandcritics.com/middleeast/features/article_1378891.php/UN_climate_report_carries_warning_for_Arab_states
Dec 5, 2007, 19:28 GMT
Cairo - Warnings against human-induced climate change resulting from greenhouse gas emissions, scarce and strained water resources, lack of food security and deteriorating human health dominated the United Nation Development Programme's newest report.
Launched in the Egypt-based League of Arab nations during an Arab environment and development ministers meeting, the UNDP's Human Development Report for 2007/2008, labelled Fighting climate change: Human solidarity in a divided world, called for collective and immediate action and warned against pessimism.
'Confronted with a problem as daunting as climate change, resigned pessimism might seem a justified response,' read the report. 'However, resigned pessimism is a luxury that the world's poor and future generations cannot afford - and there is an alternative.'
The first step lies in taking adaptive measures to climate change, unique to each countries' conditions, said the report.
The Arab world, like other regions, contributes to 'deep carbon footprints' with Egypt having some of the highest levels of carbon emissions globally.
Already, the north African country is threatened by climate shocks like floods that lessen longterm opportunities for human development. In Egypt, as in other developing counties of the Arab world, many of the poor depend on natural resources for their livelihood.
However, erosion of the coast of the Nile Delta, pollution, and salinization are affecting agricultural productivity and in turn could lead to possible loss of land.
'The evidence of climate change is there and the change will get worse. You find it in shortage of water in areas that are already short of water, like the Arab areas and Egypt,' said Mohammed al- Ashry, UNDP official and co-author of the report.
Al-Ashry told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa that the report sheds light on the percentages of the decrease of water availability in Syria, Lebanon and Egypt, mainly the Nile Delta.
Concerning Egypt, the sea level changes are causing a threat to the northern Nile Delta especially, he said.
'If you have one metre decrease in sea level then you are going to lose more than 4,500 square kilometres of the delta and around six million people will need to be relocated,' al-Ashry told dpa. Agricultural production would also be affected.
The regional report addresses the people, according to the UNDP official, and the poor in Egypt and the Arab world are suffering the most from climate change.
The report concludes that the 'expenditure on social affairs is very low for the Arab world,' said al-Ashry where the most underprivileged are those 'people who are living in work areas and suburbs.'
It's the human development aspects that Egypt and the Arab countries should focus on, from education to health care and nutrition efforts, he said.
The Arab world needs to strengthen social safety net programmes, according to report recommendations. The region is reluctant to make any tangible efforts to change the status quo; leaning instead on claims of gradual efforts, say observers.
'Everyone is talking about a gradual effort to combat climate change with time markers such as 2020, 2030 and 2050, (but) top scientists believe that the climate change will be both sudden and severe,' said al-Ashry.
In November's summit of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), member states, including Arab nations, stressed their commitment to fighting global warming and harmful environmental changes.
However, the UNDP official believes that these counties want to appear more cooperative through giving 750-million-dollar funds which are 'a drop in the bucket with the price of oil as it is,' approaching the 100-dollar-a-barrel mark.
'OPEC, I don't actually believe for a moment that they think about climate change. They are producing climate change,' said al-Ashry.
'Some of them are concerned that reducing gas emissions would mean energy efficiency, alternative energy sources, renewable energy, perhaps even nuclear (energy), and in turn cutting down on use of oil.'
'This is utter nonsense; oil will always be important and will be used. But this is a very defensive approach on their part.'
The solution? 'The combat against climate change has to be part of the economic thinking of the country, preparing strategies for human and economic development putting in mind climate change,' al-Ashry told dpa.
© 2007 dpa - Deutsche Presse-Agentur
Link: http://news.monstersandcritics.com/middleeast/features/article_1378891.php/UN_climate_report_carries_warning_for_Arab_states
Families mourn as bodies of illegal migrants return - dpa
By Pakinam Amer, dpa
First Published: 13 November, 2007
Cairo - The first signs of winter chilled Reda Attiya‘s bones as she sat huddled between her sons at the Cairo airport awaiting the casket containing the body of her nephew.
Tarek Abdel-Nabi Attiya was one of 22 illegal would-be immigrants from Egypt who drowned off the shores of Syracuse in Sicily when the boat in which they were being transported capsized last week.
Over 125 people are still missing. Search efforts are still underway, monitored by a special operations unit at the Egyptian embassy in Rome.
The ages of the missing and drowned range from 13 to mid-20s. They had attempted to travel over 1,500 kilometres of water on two fishing vessels, their boats capsized. Eleven are known to have drowned off Syracuse while there have been contradicting reports as to where a second boat sank.
The grieving woman waited eight hours for the plane bringing home the victims to arrive in the early morning hours Monday.
"His voice was choked by tears," she told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa, recounting the frantic last phone call her family received from her 24-year-old nephew.
Attiya was one of more than 100 Egyptians who had turned to a people- trafficking network that smuggles young men who are desperate for work opportunities to Italy.
He and his travel mates were stranded across the Mediterranean aboard a fishing boat where Attiya‘s life was being threatened by "crime cell members," facilitators of the illegal trip, she said.
The middle-aged woman whose face was worn by weeping, told dpa that Attiya had said he had had to pay 30,000 Egyptian pounds (5,400dollars) to facilitators "or else they will slit my throat."
Initially, she said, "we didn‘t know what to do."
"Like mad people, we went to our neighbours and relatives. We borrowed money. We sold land. We sold our livestock - the only source of living we had," said Attiya‘s son, Samir.
Samir, who did not disclose his last name, said his cousin had already paid the facilitators 5,000 Egyptian pounds before leaving for Italy via the port of Alexandria. He was supposed to pay them more money, but only if he found work.
"But they are cheaters. They took the money and gave us a corpse," said Samir.
Attiya‘s family refuse to believe that he merely drowned. They claim he was killed and thrown overboard and have called on the government to investigate the event by questioning the one person who survived the tragedy.
Reda Mohie Mohammed Khattab, a friend of Attiya, is currently being treated at the Italian Red Cross hospital.
"He‘s the only survivor, he knows what happened on this boat. He knows if our son was killed or drowned," said the soft-spoken woman. Khattab reportedly called Attiya‘s family from the hospital with"horror stories" of what happened on the boat.
Whether through Libya or Alexandria, on boat or by air, many poor young Egyptians in their early 20s have considered the idea of fleeing the country to work elsewhere.
Adel, a peasant from Fayyum who lost a family member, said people from his village will continue to "plunge into the unknown," seeping into European lands even if the possibility of death hovers.
"As long as they cannot put food on their tables, young people will risk their lives and money savings," he said. "This tragedy is the responsibility of the government. The people have no choice."
"Most of these youths did their duty towards their country. They served in the army and then went to their doom as their country watched," said Samir.
"It‘s a personal and financial ruin," one relative said.
Attempts at entering Italy illegally are always fraught with danger. Illegal migrants are usually asked to leave the boat off the coast of Italy, and swim the rest of the distance of around 10 kilometres, according to some claims.
And the scenario is not always the same, as some men reach the shore, while others drown or end up being killed in rows on the boats.
© 2007 dpa - Deutsche Presse-Agentur
First Published: 13 November, 2007
Cairo - The first signs of winter chilled Reda Attiya‘s bones as she sat huddled between her sons at the Cairo airport awaiting the casket containing the body of her nephew.
Tarek Abdel-Nabi Attiya was one of 22 illegal would-be immigrants from Egypt who drowned off the shores of Syracuse in Sicily when the boat in which they were being transported capsized last week.
Over 125 people are still missing. Search efforts are still underway, monitored by a special operations unit at the Egyptian embassy in Rome.
The ages of the missing and drowned range from 13 to mid-20s. They had attempted to travel over 1,500 kilometres of water on two fishing vessels, their boats capsized. Eleven are known to have drowned off Syracuse while there have been contradicting reports as to where a second boat sank.
The grieving woman waited eight hours for the plane bringing home the victims to arrive in the early morning hours Monday.
"His voice was choked by tears," she told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa, recounting the frantic last phone call her family received from her 24-year-old nephew.
Attiya was one of more than 100 Egyptians who had turned to a people- trafficking network that smuggles young men who are desperate for work opportunities to Italy.
He and his travel mates were stranded across the Mediterranean aboard a fishing boat where Attiya‘s life was being threatened by "crime cell members," facilitators of the illegal trip, she said.
The middle-aged woman whose face was worn by weeping, told dpa that Attiya had said he had had to pay 30,000 Egyptian pounds (5,400dollars) to facilitators "or else they will slit my throat."
Initially, she said, "we didn‘t know what to do."
"Like mad people, we went to our neighbours and relatives. We borrowed money. We sold land. We sold our livestock - the only source of living we had," said Attiya‘s son, Samir.
Samir, who did not disclose his last name, said his cousin had already paid the facilitators 5,000 Egyptian pounds before leaving for Italy via the port of Alexandria. He was supposed to pay them more money, but only if he found work.
"But they are cheaters. They took the money and gave us a corpse," said Samir.
Attiya‘s family refuse to believe that he merely drowned. They claim he was killed and thrown overboard and have called on the government to investigate the event by questioning the one person who survived the tragedy.
Reda Mohie Mohammed Khattab, a friend of Attiya, is currently being treated at the Italian Red Cross hospital.
"He‘s the only survivor, he knows what happened on this boat. He knows if our son was killed or drowned," said the soft-spoken woman. Khattab reportedly called Attiya‘s family from the hospital with"horror stories" of what happened on the boat.
Whether through Libya or Alexandria, on boat or by air, many poor young Egyptians in their early 20s have considered the idea of fleeing the country to work elsewhere.
Adel, a peasant from Fayyum who lost a family member, said people from his village will continue to "plunge into the unknown," seeping into European lands even if the possibility of death hovers.
"As long as they cannot put food on their tables, young people will risk their lives and money savings," he said. "This tragedy is the responsibility of the government. The people have no choice."
"Most of these youths did their duty towards their country. They served in the army and then went to their doom as their country watched," said Samir.
"It‘s a personal and financial ruin," one relative said.
Attempts at entering Italy illegally are always fraught with danger. Illegal migrants are usually asked to leave the boat off the coast of Italy, and swim the rest of the distance of around 10 kilometres, according to some claims.
And the scenario is not always the same, as some men reach the shore, while others drown or end up being killed in rows on the boats.
© 2007 dpa - Deutsche Presse-Agentur
Saturday, October 13, 2007
"King Farouk" turns heads, throws light on Syrian-Egyptian competition in drama - dpa
Middle East Features First Published: 12 Oct. 2007
By Pakinam Amer
Cairo - Imagine that Sir Anthony Hopkins is disparaged for playing US president Richard Nixon. It might not have happened in the West but in Egypt, dubbed the "Hollywood of the Arab World," a Syrian actor who played the last king of Egypt in a TV soap opera caused a wave of controversy even before shooting started.
Deeming the serial a "conspiracy theory," accusing Syrians of robbing Egyptians' roles and discouraging "mixing" with non-Egyptians in locally-produced drama were only a few reactions. To employ a Syrian in a role that an Egyptian could do is "to cut Egyptian actors' source of income," a prominent actor said.
Hatem Ali, the Syrian director of "al-Malek Farouk" (King Farouk) said he was keen on casting an Egyptian for the title role, without any luck. But when the final choice came down to Tayem Hassan, the 31-year- old Syrian actor who resembled Farouk, he said he had no regrets. "The impressions in the press were very good," Ali told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa.
Indeed, it took Egypt by storm. A popular newspaper even branded it "the soap opera that is currently shaking the throne of Egypt."
The 33-episode drama follows the life of Farouk of Egypt who ruled the country from 1936 until 1952 and was forced to abdicate his throne following a bloodless military coup.
From the first few episodes, it became clear how the series-makers were trying to dust away what they deemed "false perceptions" of a king who was often dismissed in history books as a womanizer, a drunkard, and a corrupt ruler who was partly responsible for the 1948 defeat in the Arab-Israeli war.
Produced by Saudi-owned broadcaster MBC, the show triggered a verbal war even before it was aired. Amr al-Qady, an Egyptian actor who played "Polly," King Farouk's Italian companion, said another actor accused him of "treachery" for working with Syrians.
Some newspaper critics even mocked the Syrian lead actor before they saw him on screen, jokingly calling him "the Syrian who became the King of Egypt." Many doubted he could master an Egyptian accent.
Veteran script writer Osama Anwar Okasha, questioned the series' agenda by accusing it of "promoting monarchy" for the benefit of its producers - an apparent gesture to Saudi royalty.
"But a TV drama - and it doesn't matter if it's American, Saudi or Israeli-produced - is not enough to oust a regime and bring back another," Anis Mansour, a senior Egyptian columnist, fired back.
But then, after all the pre-show controversy, Tayem Hassan delivered a stunning, jaw-dropping performance as the Farouk, with a flawless Egyptian accent and a portrayal with a human touch.
"Tayem Hassan is the King of Egypt now," said series scriptwriter Lamis Gaber, while a Syrian direcotr, Ghassan Abdullah, said that for many Arabs the Syrian actor has become the "true face" of the King. "Farouk himself wouldn't have done a better job," he said.
Added actress Wafaa Amer, who delivered a heart-warming performance of Queen Nazly, the king's mother: "If not Tayem Hassan, then who? The success of the series was staggering, unimaginable."
During the last week of Ramadan, newspapers started advertising for packages that promised a "re-reading of this phase in history" based on the success of the TV series. Al-Masri al-Yom newspaper ran a headline: "King Farouk: The drama series that re-wrote history."
It has already sparked comparisons between the current state of political affairs and that time when Egypt was a kingdom and under British occupation, but apparently still enjoyed a flourish in democracy, said observers.
The corruption of King Farouk's era was recorded in one single "black" book, said Mansour. "But the corruption of the republican era will need to be recorded in volumes as large as the Encyclopedia Britannica."
But apart from criticism, and comparison between historical eras, the series shed light on a sticky issue: competition between Syrian and Egyptian soap operas.
In recent years, Egypt has not been following its usual trajectory in television drama production. Fed dramas with weak plotlines and basking only in the glitter and fame of the lead star, people have been switching the channels for something different.
Then along came the Syrians with dramas rife with history, thought and geopolitical messages, that offered a change from the deluge of clichéd stories flooding the Egyptian TV screens.
In addition, Egyptians’ sojourn into historical drama through the years have not been as successful as their Syrian counterparts, usually for lack of financial resources, manpower or both.
Actress Waafa Amer said that Egyptians could benefit from how much effort is put into a project. "Costumes, make-up, everything is taken seriously. Every single person on set knows his work."
“The scale of production in historical Syrian dramas in general is huge,” said al-Qady, who acted in two Syrian-directed dramas. “They have fresh techniques in directing."
Although some filmmakers and founders of the drama industry in Egypt come from different ethnic backgrounds, some Egyptian filmmakers and actors have become "chauvinistic" when it came to embracing other cultures in art. And many Egyptian screenplay writers and directors felt they had a monopoly over "excellence in drama."
Even as soaps like King Farouk received warm praise, some voices still opposed the Syrian experiment with passion.
But according to the makers of this landmark project, the initiative was neither Syrian, nor Egyptian, nor Saudi but rather a pan-Arab product which also included a Jordanian music score composer and Lebanese make-up artists.
"We hope that this project would succeed in uniting Arabs through art - after failing to unite in politics" said scriptwriter Gaber.
Whether a joint-Arab project like this could signal an upcoming trend in regional arts, it is not clear. But the makers of Farouk could only hope that this will happen. "I have a feeling that this trend will conquer," said director Hatem Ali.
© 2007 dpa - Deutsche Presse-Agentur
note: image courtersy of Wafaa Amer
Egyptian workers occupy factory during massive strike - dpa
By Pakinam Amer
First Published: Sep 26, 2007
Cairo - Thousands of Egyptian textile workers have taken over control of one of the state's biggest mills overnight, the workers' leaders said on Wednesday during a massive strike over low wages and overdue benefits.
"My salary is now 600 (Egyptian) pounds after a service of 45 years in this factory," says 59-year-old al-Sayed Habib, a leader of the protestors. Habib and his family have spent the last three days huddled around the Mahala al-Kobra factory of Misr Helwan Spinning and Weaving Company which he considers a second home of sorts.
"I spent my life in this factory and I own nothing except my salary," Habib said, adding that monthly salaries for the textile factory range from 100 to 600 Egyptian pounds (18 to 107 US dollars).
The workers are demanding 150 days' worth of profit sharing in addition to bonuses as promised by the factory administration. They also want a larger share of the company's profit.
The resignation of the head of the Textile Holding Company Mohsen al-Jilany, Misr Helwan chairman Mahmoud al-Gibali, in addition to the dismissal of the workers' syndicate council head is also on top of their demands.
Despite being confined to the facility, the strike of 27,000 Egyptian textile workers in northern Gharbiya province has produced a shockwave among other blue-collar workers and rights advocates and has recieved extensive local media coverage.
The government is afraid that the impact of this strike would spread to other factories, according to independent observers. Government sources told a newspaper earlier that if the state responded to the workers' demands, this could encourage other workers to follow their lead.
The incident revived the memory of a 2006 mass protest where laborers in both major plants and low-paid industries organized massive strikes.
Truckloads of security forces have been cordoning off the site bursting at the seams with protestors, their families and relatives. Establishing a makeshift tent city inside the factory, the workers thronged the facility's yards day and night during the holy month of Ramadan during which Muslims fast and make supplications to God.
In addition to fasting during the day, the male and female workers hold rallies, pray and break their fast every evening on the site and jointly bang on plastic barrels in a kind of a symbolic snub. The drums signal a warning to the authorities, according to Habib. "These drums are for waking people up, they signal danger."
"Officials are deliberately giving us the cold shoulder, but we will take back our right if we continue standing," he said. Behind him, workers chanted: "We will not bow, we will not fear. We cannot afford plain bread."
An opposition member of parliament, Hamdein Sabahi, criticized the attitude of the company's shareholders. "There is a crisis due to the absence of trust. The workers do not believe that their money will be paid as the company promises."
Newspaper reports had said that the holding company head al-Jilany had already given the workers a 40-day payment. But the workers say they received only a 20-day payment, adding that the company refused to negotiate the remaining wages until early November when the company's general assembly meets.
By November, Ramadan and the financially-demanding Muslim feasts would be over, said Habib, a father of three. "Schools have also opened and we have no money."
Workers said that they have neither received reconciliatory bids nor been approached by company negotiators.
According to Sabahi, some workers are seriously considering setting up a self-directed administration as an act of defiance.
Harassment from security police has been reported. On Monday, eight Egyptian textile worker leaders were arrested. They were accused of fomenting protests and causing damage to public property. The authorities claimed that the strike cost the factory a 100-million-pound loss. They were released late Tuesday.
"(The police) also sends its scaremongers into the crowds of workers to frighten them by saying that the security forces waiting at the gates could strike any time," Habib said.
On another note, Sabahi denied that the outlawed Muslim Brotherhood had incited the strike, describing this as "a petty excuse by the government authorities."
"They think squeezing in the Muslim Brotherhood into the problem justifies a crackdown. They want this rights issue to be an extension of the war between them and the Muslim Brotherhood," Sabahi said.
Link: http://www.digitaljournal.com/article/233332/Egyptian_workers_occupy_factory_during_massive_strike
First Published: Sep 26, 2007
Cairo - Thousands of Egyptian textile workers have taken over control of one of the state's biggest mills overnight, the workers' leaders said on Wednesday during a massive strike over low wages and overdue benefits.
"My salary is now 600 (Egyptian) pounds after a service of 45 years in this factory," says 59-year-old al-Sayed Habib, a leader of the protestors. Habib and his family have spent the last three days huddled around the Mahala al-Kobra factory of Misr Helwan Spinning and Weaving Company which he considers a second home of sorts.
"I spent my life in this factory and I own nothing except my salary," Habib said, adding that monthly salaries for the textile factory range from 100 to 600 Egyptian pounds (18 to 107 US dollars).
The workers are demanding 150 days' worth of profit sharing in addition to bonuses as promised by the factory administration. They also want a larger share of the company's profit.
The resignation of the head of the Textile Holding Company Mohsen al-Jilany, Misr Helwan chairman Mahmoud al-Gibali, in addition to the dismissal of the workers' syndicate council head is also on top of their demands.
Despite being confined to the facility, the strike of 27,000 Egyptian textile workers in northern Gharbiya province has produced a shockwave among other blue-collar workers and rights advocates and has recieved extensive local media coverage.
The government is afraid that the impact of this strike would spread to other factories, according to independent observers. Government sources told a newspaper earlier that if the state responded to the workers' demands, this could encourage other workers to follow their lead.
The incident revived the memory of a 2006 mass protest where laborers in both major plants and low-paid industries organized massive strikes.
Truckloads of security forces have been cordoning off the site bursting at the seams with protestors, their families and relatives. Establishing a makeshift tent city inside the factory, the workers thronged the facility's yards day and night during the holy month of Ramadan during which Muslims fast and make supplications to God.
In addition to fasting during the day, the male and female workers hold rallies, pray and break their fast every evening on the site and jointly bang on plastic barrels in a kind of a symbolic snub. The drums signal a warning to the authorities, according to Habib. "These drums are for waking people up, they signal danger."
"Officials are deliberately giving us the cold shoulder, but we will take back our right if we continue standing," he said. Behind him, workers chanted: "We will not bow, we will not fear. We cannot afford plain bread."
An opposition member of parliament, Hamdein Sabahi, criticized the attitude of the company's shareholders. "There is a crisis due to the absence of trust. The workers do not believe that their money will be paid as the company promises."
Newspaper reports had said that the holding company head al-Jilany had already given the workers a 40-day payment. But the workers say they received only a 20-day payment, adding that the company refused to negotiate the remaining wages until early November when the company's general assembly meets.
By November, Ramadan and the financially-demanding Muslim feasts would be over, said Habib, a father of three. "Schools have also opened and we have no money."
Workers said that they have neither received reconciliatory bids nor been approached by company negotiators.
According to Sabahi, some workers are seriously considering setting up a self-directed administration as an act of defiance.
Harassment from security police has been reported. On Monday, eight Egyptian textile worker leaders were arrested. They were accused of fomenting protests and causing damage to public property. The authorities claimed that the strike cost the factory a 100-million-pound loss. They were released late Tuesday.
"(The police) also sends its scaremongers into the crowds of workers to frighten them by saying that the security forces waiting at the gates could strike any time," Habib said.
On another note, Sabahi denied that the outlawed Muslim Brotherhood had incited the strike, describing this as "a petty excuse by the government authorities."
"They think squeezing in the Muslim Brotherhood into the problem justifies a crackdown. They want this rights issue to be an extension of the war between them and the Muslim Brotherhood," Sabahi said.
Link: http://www.digitaljournal.com/article/233332/Egyptian_workers_occupy_factory_during_massive_strike
Rumours of love affair spark sectarian clashes in Egypt - dpa
By Pakinam Amer
Sep 24, 2007, 16:47 GMT
Cairo - Accounts of a love story between a young Christian man and a Muslim woman turned sour, prompting rumours, sectarian clashes and arrests in the once cosmopolitan port city of Alexandria.
On Monday, 25 Christians and Muslims answered to charges including disturbing the peace, damaging public property and using sharp objects as weapons.
The angry young men had pelted each other with stones and shards of broken glass, damaging nearby cars and private property in the process.
The brawl ensued late Friday in a poor part of the Sidi Bishr district during prayers that are held in observance of the holy month of Ramadan during which Muslims fast and make supplications to God.
'Throngs of people were attacking each other. A man wearing a face veil was throwing stones at Christians, and women were standing in balconies cheering on the Muslims, shouting 'God is Great',' said a Christian witness. 'They shouted 'Christians are sons of dogs'.'
According to the witness, the Christian groups sought refuge from the stones in entrances to buildings. Six Muslims were injured in the clashes as well as three Christians.
The truth is lost about the real cause of the clashes as both groups hurled accusations at each other and circulated different accounts.
As Muslims alleged that a love story had illicitly developed between 21-year-old Sami Samir and a young woman, Christians rejected the accounts saying that Muslims had attacked them for other reasons.
'The Muslim guys are only jealous because our family has a car and two cafeterias while being Christian,' said a relative of Samir.
The incidence of religiously-motivated violence is escalating in Alexandria, a city that used to be home to Jews, Muslims, and Christians and sheltered many expatriate foreign communities until the late 1950s.
Observers believe that Alexandria is gradually embracing religious radicalism and a form of bigotry alien to its reputation as a tolerant metropolis.
Despite being a summer resort, popular for its long stretches of beaches and sea activities, the attire of women in particular is becoming more and more conservative even on hot summer days.
Men wearing white ankle-length robes and women dressed in black from head to toe except for two slits for the eyes are a common sight.
Mosques and churches have started replacing other societal institutions, offering not only moral direction but also social, legal and political guidance to the faithful.
Whether they blame the so-called Salafi movements, followers of a strict form of Islam akin to Saudi Arabia's austere Wahabism or the popular Muslim Brotherhood, many observers have agreed that the 'overly-conservative religious groups' had a role in changing the face of Alexandria.
An Alexandrian recounted how a sheikh kept intimidating him after discovering that he was a Christian. 'He would ask me why I believed in the Bible. I used to run from him.'
Although a leader of the conservative Muslim Brotherhood himself, Ali Abdel-Fatah believes that religious clerics are using the economic and political turmoil that Egypt is enduring to mobilize Muslims and Christians against each other.
'In Alexandria, Muslims take shelter in mosques. Christians find asylum in their church. This leads to the blunt expression of religious views and so clashes, and confrontations ensue,' said Abdel-Fatah.
'When a love affair turns into a sectarian row, we know we have a big problem,' said Kamal Habib, member of the Supreme Church Council in Alexandria. 'A road accident could easily spur a religious rift these days.'
The recent street riots in Alexandria rekindled memories of violent incidents in 2006 when an extremist, claimed by security authorities to have been mentally deranged, attacked four churches in Alexandria. An elderly Coptic citizen was stabbed to death and five others were injured.
In 2005, on two consecutive Fridays, Muslims attacked St George's Church in Alexandria's Moharam Bek district, incensed by the leaking of a CD containing a play performed inside the church and considered disdainful of the Prophet Mohammed.
'The state cannot punish the church like it punishes religious institutions and so people take matters into their own hands and seek to regain their rights by use of force,' said Abdel-Fatah.
© 2007 dpa - Deutsche Presse-Agentur
© Copyright 2007 by monstersandcritics.com.
This notice cannot be removed without permission.
Link: http://news.monstersandcritics.com/middleeast/features/article_1359190.php/Rumours_of_love_affair_spark_sectarian_clashes_in_Egypt
Sep 24, 2007, 16:47 GMT
Cairo - Accounts of a love story between a young Christian man and a Muslim woman turned sour, prompting rumours, sectarian clashes and arrests in the once cosmopolitan port city of Alexandria.
On Monday, 25 Christians and Muslims answered to charges including disturbing the peace, damaging public property and using sharp objects as weapons.
The angry young men had pelted each other with stones and shards of broken glass, damaging nearby cars and private property in the process.
The brawl ensued late Friday in a poor part of the Sidi Bishr district during prayers that are held in observance of the holy month of Ramadan during which Muslims fast and make supplications to God.
'Throngs of people were attacking each other. A man wearing a face veil was throwing stones at Christians, and women were standing in balconies cheering on the Muslims, shouting 'God is Great',' said a Christian witness. 'They shouted 'Christians are sons of dogs'.'
According to the witness, the Christian groups sought refuge from the stones in entrances to buildings. Six Muslims were injured in the clashes as well as three Christians.
The truth is lost about the real cause of the clashes as both groups hurled accusations at each other and circulated different accounts.
As Muslims alleged that a love story had illicitly developed between 21-year-old Sami Samir and a young woman, Christians rejected the accounts saying that Muslims had attacked them for other reasons.
'The Muslim guys are only jealous because our family has a car and two cafeterias while being Christian,' said a relative of Samir.
The incidence of religiously-motivated violence is escalating in Alexandria, a city that used to be home to Jews, Muslims, and Christians and sheltered many expatriate foreign communities until the late 1950s.
Observers believe that Alexandria is gradually embracing religious radicalism and a form of bigotry alien to its reputation as a tolerant metropolis.
Despite being a summer resort, popular for its long stretches of beaches and sea activities, the attire of women in particular is becoming more and more conservative even on hot summer days.
Men wearing white ankle-length robes and women dressed in black from head to toe except for two slits for the eyes are a common sight.
Mosques and churches have started replacing other societal institutions, offering not only moral direction but also social, legal and political guidance to the faithful.
Whether they blame the so-called Salafi movements, followers of a strict form of Islam akin to Saudi Arabia's austere Wahabism or the popular Muslim Brotherhood, many observers have agreed that the 'overly-conservative religious groups' had a role in changing the face of Alexandria.
An Alexandrian recounted how a sheikh kept intimidating him after discovering that he was a Christian. 'He would ask me why I believed in the Bible. I used to run from him.'
Although a leader of the conservative Muslim Brotherhood himself, Ali Abdel-Fatah believes that religious clerics are using the economic and political turmoil that Egypt is enduring to mobilize Muslims and Christians against each other.
'In Alexandria, Muslims take shelter in mosques. Christians find asylum in their church. This leads to the blunt expression of religious views and so clashes, and confrontations ensue,' said Abdel-Fatah.
'When a love affair turns into a sectarian row, we know we have a big problem,' said Kamal Habib, member of the Supreme Church Council in Alexandria. 'A road accident could easily spur a religious rift these days.'
The recent street riots in Alexandria rekindled memories of violent incidents in 2006 when an extremist, claimed by security authorities to have been mentally deranged, attacked four churches in Alexandria. An elderly Coptic citizen was stabbed to death and five others were injured.
In 2005, on two consecutive Fridays, Muslims attacked St George's Church in Alexandria's Moharam Bek district, incensed by the leaking of a CD containing a play performed inside the church and considered disdainful of the Prophet Mohammed.
'The state cannot punish the church like it punishes religious institutions and so people take matters into their own hands and seek to regain their rights by use of force,' said Abdel-Fatah.
© 2007 dpa - Deutsche Presse-Agentur
© Copyright 2007 by monstersandcritics.com.
This notice cannot be removed without permission.
Link: http://news.monstersandcritics.com/middleeast/features/article_1359190.php/Rumours_of_love_affair_spark_sectarian_clashes_in_Egypt
Iraq oil industry workers protest controversial oil bill - dpa
By Pakinam Amer, dpa
First Published: Tue, 18 Sep 2007 06:06:46 GMT
Cairo - While Iraq's political parties are failing to reach a compromise on the hotly-debated oil and gas draft law, oil workers in oil-rich Basra continue almost daily protests, branding themselves ”the defenders of the country's oil.”
Basra's oil workers' union is uncompromisingly setting itself against the law, approved by Iraq's cabinet but stalled in parliament.
The trade union believes that a deluge of foreign contractors would gradually but eventually lead to the privatization of the oil sector, a notion it vehemently opposes.
A landmark political and economic step, the debated law will decide over the control of the country's existing as well as untapped oil-reserves, which are mainly in the Kurdish-controlled north and the Shiite-dominated south.
In principle, the draft law outlines the procedures and guidelines for oil transactions based on articles 11 and 112 of the constitution. The government had said that it is to be designed in a way that makes Iraqis the prime owners of the country's oil and gas wealth.
In conferences and media outlets, however, the mostly Shiite Basra oil workers and union members claim that the law allows the government to ”sell the country's wealth” for capitalist gains.
Iraq has the third largest oil reserves in the world. However, many of the existing oil fields have not been utilized since the 1970s. The current oil reserves are estimated to be equivalent to 115 billion barrels.
During their demonstrations against the draft law, the protesters in the oil industry and trade unions have been warning the oil ministry of the centralized government in Baghdad against ignoring their calls, while vowing to continue their rowdy protests.
In response, Oil Minister Hussein Shahristani banned unions from giving their say during discussions of the much-anticipated legislation.
By contrast, Ibrahim Bahr al-Oloum, former Iraqi oil minister told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa that the oil workers should be allowed to have their say: ”These unions should have a position (regarding the law) and their perspective should be considered. Unions protect oil workers.”
”Discussions should be open,” he said. He added the local media were playing a part in defaming the controversial bill, but he also believed that the government was vague in explaining the law.
”The people have a foggy picture” of what the legislation entitles, he said.
Meanwhile, Washington has been pushing for a speedy approval of the law, prompting many Iraqis, especially those in Iraq's oil-rich regions, to doubt the real motives of the Bush administration.
Many workers believe that the deal described as a ”profit-sharing” agreement by Premier Nuri al-Maliki and his cabinet is in reality intended to exploit Iraq's lucrative energy resources for the sake of US oil drillers and corporations.
According to former Oil Minister Bahr al-Oloum, one of the disputed elements of the law is the section describing the role of the national oil company and its role in the country's energy wealth.
The law had suggested that Iraq's national oil company would be restructured and turned into an independent holding company. This company would then be in charge of implementing national oil policy, according to a publicized draft of the law.
But the law does not guarantee Iraq's supremacy over its reserves since it does not outline a quota reserved to protect this holding company against foreign competitors, Bahr al-Oloum said.
”The national oil company should not be dealt with as a competitor to foreign contractors. The priority in contracts should be given tothe national company. Its share should not go below 51 per cent,” the former minister added.
Foreign companies and US oil giants are already queuing to sign exploration and production deals and to book oil reserves in Iraq.
”All the oil companies have been salivating at the prospect ofIraq for years. There is a good chance of very large discoveries. Nowhere else in the world offers that,” David Horgan, oil expert and managing director of Petret Resources, which has an operation in Iraq, told the UK's Guardian newspaper recently.
Most oil fields are located in the south of Iraq near oil-rich cities like Basra, West al-Qurna, Majnoun, Nahran Omar, Rafideen, Helfaya, Sabba, Lahees and Bazrkan.
Other areas like Kirkuk in the north, eastern Baghdad, al-Ahdab, Nasiriyah, and Artawy are also famous for their oil fields.
In Baghdad, discussions on the draft bill collapsed as Kurds, Sunnis and Shiites became divided on clauses regulating the power balance between the regions and the different Iraqi groups.
Sunnis feared the law would decentralize management of the oil fields. Shiites and Kurds contended for control over them, voicing considerations against annexes placing oil fields under the full control of the national company in Baghdad.
Given the amount of controversy ahead of the bill's parliamentary approval, some observers predict even more arguments to ensue over the execution of the law itself.
Copyright, respective author or news agency
Link: http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/109399.html
First Published: Tue, 18 Sep 2007 06:06:46 GMT
Cairo - While Iraq's political parties are failing to reach a compromise on the hotly-debated oil and gas draft law, oil workers in oil-rich Basra continue almost daily protests, branding themselves ”the defenders of the country's oil.”
Basra's oil workers' union is uncompromisingly setting itself against the law, approved by Iraq's cabinet but stalled in parliament.
The trade union believes that a deluge of foreign contractors would gradually but eventually lead to the privatization of the oil sector, a notion it vehemently opposes.
A landmark political and economic step, the debated law will decide over the control of the country's existing as well as untapped oil-reserves, which are mainly in the Kurdish-controlled north and the Shiite-dominated south.
In principle, the draft law outlines the procedures and guidelines for oil transactions based on articles 11 and 112 of the constitution. The government had said that it is to be designed in a way that makes Iraqis the prime owners of the country's oil and gas wealth.
In conferences and media outlets, however, the mostly Shiite Basra oil workers and union members claim that the law allows the government to ”sell the country's wealth” for capitalist gains.
Iraq has the third largest oil reserves in the world. However, many of the existing oil fields have not been utilized since the 1970s. The current oil reserves are estimated to be equivalent to 115 billion barrels.
During their demonstrations against the draft law, the protesters in the oil industry and trade unions have been warning the oil ministry of the centralized government in Baghdad against ignoring their calls, while vowing to continue their rowdy protests.
In response, Oil Minister Hussein Shahristani banned unions from giving their say during discussions of the much-anticipated legislation.
By contrast, Ibrahim Bahr al-Oloum, former Iraqi oil minister told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa that the oil workers should be allowed to have their say: ”These unions should have a position (regarding the law) and their perspective should be considered. Unions protect oil workers.”
”Discussions should be open,” he said. He added the local media were playing a part in defaming the controversial bill, but he also believed that the government was vague in explaining the law.
”The people have a foggy picture” of what the legislation entitles, he said.
Meanwhile, Washington has been pushing for a speedy approval of the law, prompting many Iraqis, especially those in Iraq's oil-rich regions, to doubt the real motives of the Bush administration.
Many workers believe that the deal described as a ”profit-sharing” agreement by Premier Nuri al-Maliki and his cabinet is in reality intended to exploit Iraq's lucrative energy resources for the sake of US oil drillers and corporations.
According to former Oil Minister Bahr al-Oloum, one of the disputed elements of the law is the section describing the role of the national oil company and its role in the country's energy wealth.
The law had suggested that Iraq's national oil company would be restructured and turned into an independent holding company. This company would then be in charge of implementing national oil policy, according to a publicized draft of the law.
But the law does not guarantee Iraq's supremacy over its reserves since it does not outline a quota reserved to protect this holding company against foreign competitors, Bahr al-Oloum said.
”The national oil company should not be dealt with as a competitor to foreign contractors. The priority in contracts should be given tothe national company. Its share should not go below 51 per cent,” the former minister added.
Foreign companies and US oil giants are already queuing to sign exploration and production deals and to book oil reserves in Iraq.
”All the oil companies have been salivating at the prospect ofIraq for years. There is a good chance of very large discoveries. Nowhere else in the world offers that,” David Horgan, oil expert and managing director of Petret Resources, which has an operation in Iraq, told the UK's Guardian newspaper recently.
Most oil fields are located in the south of Iraq near oil-rich cities like Basra, West al-Qurna, Majnoun, Nahran Omar, Rafideen, Helfaya, Sabba, Lahees and Bazrkan.
Other areas like Kirkuk in the north, eastern Baghdad, al-Ahdab, Nasiriyah, and Artawy are also famous for their oil fields.
In Baghdad, discussions on the draft bill collapsed as Kurds, Sunnis and Shiites became divided on clauses regulating the power balance between the regions and the different Iraqi groups.
Sunnis feared the law would decentralize management of the oil fields. Shiites and Kurds contended for control over them, voicing considerations against annexes placing oil fields under the full control of the national company in Baghdad.
Given the amount of controversy ahead of the bill's parliamentary approval, some observers predict even more arguments to ensue over the execution of the law itself.
Copyright, respective author or news agency
Link: http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/109399.html
Tuesday, September 25, 2007
Future of Iraqi government at stake as blocs withdraw -dpa
Middle East Features
By Pakinam Amer
Sep 17, 2007, 15:35 GMT
Cairo - Politicians and observers in Iraq have expressed concern over the withdrawal of major blocs from Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki's ruling coalition.
Growing tension between various factions and the shifting political landscape has prompted questions about the future of the precarious government.
Reports on Monday said that some blocs are already negotiationg new alliances in Iraq's Council of Representatives which may be opposed to the government.
The political force loyal to radical cleric Moqtada al-Sadr quit al-Maliki's governing Shiite alliance leaving 30 seats empty, on Sunday, after a boycott lasting months.
The Iraqi Accord Front, the largest Sunni party, has already withdrawn and other Shiite and secular factions have boycotted recent sessions and voted only on legislation.
Both the ruling alliance and President Jalal Talabani's office issued statements Monday urging the Sadrists to reconsider their decision and return to government. The ruling United Iraqi Alliance described the move as shocking.
Some members of the ruling alliance have denied that the government is threatened. Sadr MPs have shown little or no activity for many months, they said.
The Sadrists however claim they were intentionally marginalized. The Sadr camp was not included in discussions on key legislation like the debated oil and gas draft law.
They were also shunned from talks on de-Baathification policies which might lead to the return of loyalists to former dictator Saddam Hussein 'whose hands were not stained with Iraqi blood', according to a-Maliki, to government jobs.
Ruling party moderates nevertheless formed a special council to negotiate with the dissident Sadrists to tackle the core issues of conflict, according to the United Iraqi Alliance.
But the Sadrists insist that their decision is both final and consequential. Asmaa al-Mussawy, a leading member of the Sadr camp, told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa that 'there is no going back.'
The leaders of the Sadr bloc have claimed that MPs belonging to al-Maliki's Daawa party might quit the ruling coalition and join the Sadr camp.
The Islamic Daawa party is an Iraqi conservative party, and along with the Supreme Islamic Iraqi council, forms the bulk of the ruling Shiite coalition known as the United Iraqi Alliance.
The alliance has 128 of the Council of Representative's 275 seats of which Daawa occupies 13.
'The Daawa party, the (Sunni) Iraqi Accord Front, the (Shiite) al- Fadila, the National Dialogue Front are all engaged in dialogue with the Sadr for a new political programme that we cannot publicize at the moment,' said al-Mussawy on Monday.
'These are all parties who could very well forge an alliance with the Sadr, but nothing is final yet,' the Sadrist added.
Abdel-Karim al-Anzy, Daawa's chief in Iraq, confirmed talks with Sadrists and a possible withdrawal.
Observers say these alliances, if created, could herald the collapse of al-Maliki's cabinet.
But even lawmakers are divided on whether al-Maliki's cabinet and the ruling coalition would be weakened by the withdrawal of major blocs - mainly Sunnis and the Shiite Sadr camp- as al-Maliki still enjoys a legitimate albeit thin majority in parliament.
Even if new alliances are formed, al-Maliki would still be able to secure the passage of controversial laws, if he guarantees the allegiance of the Kurdistani Alliance with 53 seats in the Council of Representatives, according to local analysts.
Sadrists have so far ruled out the possibility of a no-confidence vote to bring down the government.
But the government has already been dealt a blow, according to observers. Sadr's withdrawal, coupled with the failure of al-Maliki to reconcile with Sunnis and other opposing parties, caused a split in Daawa party ranks.
Daawa's Al-Anzy described the Sadr departure as a 'hard blow' adding to Voices of Iraq news agency's comments that al-Maliki had begun aggravating rifts within his own party when he signed agreements with Shiite and Kurdish bigwigs while disregarding Sadrists and Sunnis.
Despite the hustle and bustle, some politicians refuse to take the moves of the Sadr bloc seriously.
The Shiite camp have a history of repeated threats, withdrawal and return to parliament.
Last year, Sadrists froze their membership in parliament after loud and angry anti-government protests. But they returned as soon as some of their demands had been met.
© 2007 dpa - Deutsche Presse-Agentur
© Copyright 2007 by monstersandcritics.com.
This notice cannot be removed without permission.
Link: http://news.monstersandcritics.com/middleeast/features/printer_1356762.php
By Pakinam Amer
Sep 17, 2007, 15:35 GMT
Cairo - Politicians and observers in Iraq have expressed concern over the withdrawal of major blocs from Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki's ruling coalition.
Growing tension between various factions and the shifting political landscape has prompted questions about the future of the precarious government.
Reports on Monday said that some blocs are already negotiationg new alliances in Iraq's Council of Representatives which may be opposed to the government.
The political force loyal to radical cleric Moqtada al-Sadr quit al-Maliki's governing Shiite alliance leaving 30 seats empty, on Sunday, after a boycott lasting months.
The Iraqi Accord Front, the largest Sunni party, has already withdrawn and other Shiite and secular factions have boycotted recent sessions and voted only on legislation.
Both the ruling alliance and President Jalal Talabani's office issued statements Monday urging the Sadrists to reconsider their decision and return to government. The ruling United Iraqi Alliance described the move as shocking.
Some members of the ruling alliance have denied that the government is threatened. Sadr MPs have shown little or no activity for many months, they said.
The Sadrists however claim they were intentionally marginalized. The Sadr camp was not included in discussions on key legislation like the debated oil and gas draft law.
They were also shunned from talks on de-Baathification policies which might lead to the return of loyalists to former dictator Saddam Hussein 'whose hands were not stained with Iraqi blood', according to a-Maliki, to government jobs.
Ruling party moderates nevertheless formed a special council to negotiate with the dissident Sadrists to tackle the core issues of conflict, according to the United Iraqi Alliance.
But the Sadrists insist that their decision is both final and consequential. Asmaa al-Mussawy, a leading member of the Sadr camp, told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa that 'there is no going back.'
The leaders of the Sadr bloc have claimed that MPs belonging to al-Maliki's Daawa party might quit the ruling coalition and join the Sadr camp.
The Islamic Daawa party is an Iraqi conservative party, and along with the Supreme Islamic Iraqi council, forms the bulk of the ruling Shiite coalition known as the United Iraqi Alliance.
The alliance has 128 of the Council of Representative's 275 seats of which Daawa occupies 13.
'The Daawa party, the (Sunni) Iraqi Accord Front, the (Shiite) al- Fadila, the National Dialogue Front are all engaged in dialogue with the Sadr for a new political programme that we cannot publicize at the moment,' said al-Mussawy on Monday.
'These are all parties who could very well forge an alliance with the Sadr, but nothing is final yet,' the Sadrist added.
Abdel-Karim al-Anzy, Daawa's chief in Iraq, confirmed talks with Sadrists and a possible withdrawal.
Observers say these alliances, if created, could herald the collapse of al-Maliki's cabinet.
But even lawmakers are divided on whether al-Maliki's cabinet and the ruling coalition would be weakened by the withdrawal of major blocs - mainly Sunnis and the Shiite Sadr camp- as al-Maliki still enjoys a legitimate albeit thin majority in parliament.
Even if new alliances are formed, al-Maliki would still be able to secure the passage of controversial laws, if he guarantees the allegiance of the Kurdistani Alliance with 53 seats in the Council of Representatives, according to local analysts.
Sadrists have so far ruled out the possibility of a no-confidence vote to bring down the government.
But the government has already been dealt a blow, according to observers. Sadr's withdrawal, coupled with the failure of al-Maliki to reconcile with Sunnis and other opposing parties, caused a split in Daawa party ranks.
Daawa's Al-Anzy described the Sadr departure as a 'hard blow' adding to Voices of Iraq news agency's comments that al-Maliki had begun aggravating rifts within his own party when he signed agreements with Shiite and Kurdish bigwigs while disregarding Sadrists and Sunnis.
Despite the hustle and bustle, some politicians refuse to take the moves of the Sadr bloc seriously.
The Shiite camp have a history of repeated threats, withdrawal and return to parliament.
Last year, Sadrists froze their membership in parliament after loud and angry anti-government protests. But they returned as soon as some of their demands had been met.
© 2007 dpa - Deutsche Presse-Agentur
© Copyright 2007 by monstersandcritics.com.
This notice cannot be removed without permission.
Link: http://news.monstersandcritics.com/middleeast/features/printer_1356762.php
Ramadan serials court controversy - Aljazeera English
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/826BCEE8-1442-46CA-9417-8CAC0270E4B6.htm
By Pakinam Amer in Cairo
This Ramadan, television serials depicting sex, politics and war will be beamed into Arab living rooms, raising the stakes on contentious socio-political issues and risking a backlash.
The themes have, over the years, become more brazen.
In the Egyptian programme A Case of Public Opinion (Kadeyet Ray Aam), Yousra, an Egyptian actor and former sex symbol, plays a prominent university professor who is one of three women violently raped while returning home from work.
She and the women are immediately victimised - not only by the violent act but by a society unwilling, and perhaps unprepared, to hear out their trauma and angst.
But Yousra's character overcomes the shame and shunning associated with rape and persistently pushes the horror of the crime – and subsequently, women's role in a patriarchal community – to the fore.
Abier el-Barbary, a psychologist and member of a local women's rights group, believes Ramadan is an ideal time to raise awareness of issues that are otherwise ignored.
She said: "Yousra is a guaranteed role model for many generations of women. She's not a sex-symbol anymore and her western attire gives a message that she's easier to approach."
"To use her as an icon to spread a direly needed message is a great idea."
Social Trauma
The show begins airing throughout the Middle East on the first day of Ramadan (September 13) but it has already stirred controversy, as Arab satellite talk shows and the press debate whether the depiction and discussion of violent sexual trauma has a place during Ramadan.
Arab media reported that Yousra was injured during filming of the much-anticipated rape scene, and that she had suffered "psychological trauma". The reports left people speculating about the intensity of the scene and whether it will breach any taboos.
But the theme seems designed to go for the jugular. Many Egyptian women have stories, usually branded as "shameful" and "embarrassing", of public harassment and even outright sexual assault in public.
A recent statistical study carried out by the Egyptian Centre for Women's Rights revealed that 40 per cent of women have experienced sexual harassment.
In October 2006, Wael Abbas, a human rights activist, captured video images of throngs of men pulling scarves off veiled women and ganging up on two or three women at a time in downtown Cairo.
One picture even showed a group of girls taking sanctuary in a downtown store, crowds of men waiting at the door as a number of police officers seemed unable to contain the pandemonium.
"It is important that a big star like Yousra adopts such an issue," Wael Abbas told Al Jazeera.
Government agenda?
But some critics have questioned whether there is a government agenda behind A Case of Public Opinion and other shows similar in tone.
In recent years, Arab governments have endorsed the dramatisation of several issues, particularly terrorism, as a means to raise awareness.
After Saudi Arabia endured a rash of terror attacks, notably a November 2003 attack on a compound housing Arabs in Riyadh, the Saudi capital, regional production companies rolled out serials with a distinct anti-extremism message.
Abbas told Al Jazeera: "Sometimes these dramas are done to produce a desired calculated reaction in Arab and foreign circles. Ramadan shows are used as tools."
Noha Maarouf, a Cairo-based social psychologist, agrees, saying that many Arabic dramas propagate the political agendas of local governments.
"Some hot topics are raised in drama to keep people talking. People will be preoccupied discussing Ramadan soap operas for the next six months."
However, she believes Arab governments prefer controversy which could divert attention as cabinets are reshuffled and inflation soars.
"There is usually a sporadic reaction to these dramas and, even if people hate them, they serve as a good distraction," she told Al Jazeera.
"What would the government like more? If people criticise Ramadan television or [if they] criticise their policies and actions?"
Politics, corruption, and war
Nevertheless, Ramadan viewers this year will still get their share of political intrigue, cabinet betrayals, and the topic du jour – inheritance of power.
In the Egyptian-Syrian joint production King Farouk, the producers have promised a new reading of Egypt's monarchy set against post-World War I colonial occupation of Arab countries and the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.
Abbas believes the choice to produce and air the serial is itself a political gambit.
"Today in Egypt we are passing through a stage where inheritance of power - not unlike the case when Egypt was a kingdom - is a likely scenario," he told Al Jazeera.
Opposition parties have accused Hosni Mubarak, the 79-year-old president of Egypt, of grooming his son, rising politician Gamal Mubarak, to inherit the presidency.
Mohammed Abu-Seif, a director of Arabic serials, says independent production houses are giving Ramadan audiences exactly what they clamour for - contentious political issues and scandal.
"Politics rules the state that we live in now as we have reached a point of frustration where we have nothing but words to offer," he told Al Jazeera.
"It's a [situation] where both the rich and the poor suffer and so politics is present in every drama."
In one such upcoming drama, Nour al-Sherif plays the character of Saad al-Daly, a crooked businessman-cum-cabinet minister who uses his position for personal wealth and latitude.
The drama, titled Al-Daly, unfolds between 1965 and 1997 and traces Egypt's history through a gamut of political events that include the 1967 war and resulting defeat, the 1973 Yom Kippur war, and the assassination of Anwar Sadat, the former Egyptian president.
Syrian TV revisits history
King Farouk and Al-Daly are the latest historical re-dramatisations based on a trend which vaulted Syrian productions into the limelight in recent years.
Since the late 1990s, Syrian serials, acclaimed for their historical themes and finger-in-the-eye satirical comedies, have slowly edged their Egyptian counterparts.
This has created often fierce rivalry as both countries vie for Arab audiences.
And this Ramadan is no different.
The 2006 war between Israel and Lebanon is a common plotline in at least two Syrian soap operas, while another two dramas recount the injustices of the Ottoman rule and the French occupation of Arab states.
Syrian producers are sticking with their formulae - revisiting bloody chapters in Arab history, ones riddled with tales of injustice and occupation.
"If you want to pass on certain information or wittingly avoid censorship, you can always escape to history," says Mona Wasef, a Syrian actor famous for her politically-charged roles.
"Sometimes you hide behind history when you want to present forbidden thought," she told Al Jazeera.
Abu-Seif agrees, adding that historical dramatisations are a serial writer's best tactics to evade censorship and avoid having their material end up on the cutting room floor.
History versus reality
Whether these themes are a subdued reminder of a poignant Arab reality, Saad al-Qassem, the Damascus-based editor of Al-Fonoun (Arts) magazine, is unsure.
"Why do certain historical shows surface at certain times? Well, it could be an undertone of the contemporary state of politics," al-Qassem said.
He believes Arab audiences like to compare between the political status quo and the historical dramas to examine whether history repeats itself after all.
He said: "People in Syria are more attracted now to dramas that speak of past glories. It is not a surprise that under our current political climate people derive collective strength from their history."
By Pakinam Amer in Cairo
This Ramadan, television serials depicting sex, politics and war will be beamed into Arab living rooms, raising the stakes on contentious socio-political issues and risking a backlash.
The themes have, over the years, become more brazen.
In the Egyptian programme A Case of Public Opinion (Kadeyet Ray Aam), Yousra, an Egyptian actor and former sex symbol, plays a prominent university professor who is one of three women violently raped while returning home from work.
She and the women are immediately victimised - not only by the violent act but by a society unwilling, and perhaps unprepared, to hear out their trauma and angst.
But Yousra's character overcomes the shame and shunning associated with rape and persistently pushes the horror of the crime – and subsequently, women's role in a patriarchal community – to the fore.
Abier el-Barbary, a psychologist and member of a local women's rights group, believes Ramadan is an ideal time to raise awareness of issues that are otherwise ignored.
She said: "Yousra is a guaranteed role model for many generations of women. She's not a sex-symbol anymore and her western attire gives a message that she's easier to approach."
"To use her as an icon to spread a direly needed message is a great idea."
Social Trauma
The show begins airing throughout the Middle East on the first day of Ramadan (September 13) but it has already stirred controversy, as Arab satellite talk shows and the press debate whether the depiction and discussion of violent sexual trauma has a place during Ramadan.
Arab media reported that Yousra was injured during filming of the much-anticipated rape scene, and that she had suffered "psychological trauma". The reports left people speculating about the intensity of the scene and whether it will breach any taboos.
But the theme seems designed to go for the jugular. Many Egyptian women have stories, usually branded as "shameful" and "embarrassing", of public harassment and even outright sexual assault in public.
A recent statistical study carried out by the Egyptian Centre for Women's Rights revealed that 40 per cent of women have experienced sexual harassment.
In October 2006, Wael Abbas, a human rights activist, captured video images of throngs of men pulling scarves off veiled women and ganging up on two or three women at a time in downtown Cairo.
One picture even showed a group of girls taking sanctuary in a downtown store, crowds of men waiting at the door as a number of police officers seemed unable to contain the pandemonium.
"It is important that a big star like Yousra adopts such an issue," Wael Abbas told Al Jazeera.
Government agenda?
But some critics have questioned whether there is a government agenda behind A Case of Public Opinion and other shows similar in tone.
In recent years, Arab governments have endorsed the dramatisation of several issues, particularly terrorism, as a means to raise awareness.
After Saudi Arabia endured a rash of terror attacks, notably a November 2003 attack on a compound housing Arabs in Riyadh, the Saudi capital, regional production companies rolled out serials with a distinct anti-extremism message.
Abbas told Al Jazeera: "Sometimes these dramas are done to produce a desired calculated reaction in Arab and foreign circles. Ramadan shows are used as tools."
Noha Maarouf, a Cairo-based social psychologist, agrees, saying that many Arabic dramas propagate the political agendas of local governments.
"Some hot topics are raised in drama to keep people talking. People will be preoccupied discussing Ramadan soap operas for the next six months."
However, she believes Arab governments prefer controversy which could divert attention as cabinets are reshuffled and inflation soars.
"There is usually a sporadic reaction to these dramas and, even if people hate them, they serve as a good distraction," she told Al Jazeera.
"What would the government like more? If people criticise Ramadan television or [if they] criticise their policies and actions?"
Politics, corruption, and war
Nevertheless, Ramadan viewers this year will still get their share of political intrigue, cabinet betrayals, and the topic du jour – inheritance of power.
In the Egyptian-Syrian joint production King Farouk, the producers have promised a new reading of Egypt's monarchy set against post-World War I colonial occupation of Arab countries and the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.
Abbas believes the choice to produce and air the serial is itself a political gambit.
"Today in Egypt we are passing through a stage where inheritance of power - not unlike the case when Egypt was a kingdom - is a likely scenario," he told Al Jazeera.
Opposition parties have accused Hosni Mubarak, the 79-year-old president of Egypt, of grooming his son, rising politician Gamal Mubarak, to inherit the presidency.
Mohammed Abu-Seif, a director of Arabic serials, says independent production houses are giving Ramadan audiences exactly what they clamour for - contentious political issues and scandal.
"Politics rules the state that we live in now as we have reached a point of frustration where we have nothing but words to offer," he told Al Jazeera.
"It's a [situation] where both the rich and the poor suffer and so politics is present in every drama."
In one such upcoming drama, Nour al-Sherif plays the character of Saad al-Daly, a crooked businessman-cum-cabinet minister who uses his position for personal wealth and latitude.
The drama, titled Al-Daly, unfolds between 1965 and 1997 and traces Egypt's history through a gamut of political events that include the 1967 war and resulting defeat, the 1973 Yom Kippur war, and the assassination of Anwar Sadat, the former Egyptian president.
Syrian TV revisits history
King Farouk and Al-Daly are the latest historical re-dramatisations based on a trend which vaulted Syrian productions into the limelight in recent years.
Since the late 1990s, Syrian serials, acclaimed for their historical themes and finger-in-the-eye satirical comedies, have slowly edged their Egyptian counterparts.
This has created often fierce rivalry as both countries vie for Arab audiences.
And this Ramadan is no different.
The 2006 war between Israel and Lebanon is a common plotline in at least two Syrian soap operas, while another two dramas recount the injustices of the Ottoman rule and the French occupation of Arab states.
Syrian producers are sticking with their formulae - revisiting bloody chapters in Arab history, ones riddled with tales of injustice and occupation.
"If you want to pass on certain information or wittingly avoid censorship, you can always escape to history," says Mona Wasef, a Syrian actor famous for her politically-charged roles.
"Sometimes you hide behind history when you want to present forbidden thought," she told Al Jazeera.
Abu-Seif agrees, adding that historical dramatisations are a serial writer's best tactics to evade censorship and avoid having their material end up on the cutting room floor.
History versus reality
Whether these themes are a subdued reminder of a poignant Arab reality, Saad al-Qassem, the Damascus-based editor of Al-Fonoun (Arts) magazine, is unsure.
"Why do certain historical shows surface at certain times? Well, it could be an undertone of the contemporary state of politics," al-Qassem said.
He believes Arab audiences like to compare between the political status quo and the historical dramas to examine whether history repeats itself after all.
He said: "People in Syria are more attracted now to dramas that speak of past glories. It is not a surprise that under our current political climate people derive collective strength from their history."
Monday, September 10, 2007
NEWS FEATURE: Iraqis divided over results of US troop surge - dpa
Middle East NewsBy Kazem al-Akabi and Pakinam Amer
Sep 10, 2007, 14:57 GMT
Baghdad/Cairo - Debate over the achievements and shortcomings of the US troop surge plan has left Iraqis divided with many branding the strategy a failure.
US commander in Iraq, General David Petraeus, and Ryan C Crocker, American ambassador to Iraq, were expected Monday to report to Congress about the progress made since US President George W Bush announced his revised Iraq strategy, in which he pledged in January to increase troop numbers by 20,000 soldiers.
The surge took place between February and June. In Baghdad, where a new security plan was enacted hand-in-hand with the increase in the number of troops last February, many Iraqis believed that the increased US presence would save the country from the horrors of civil war.
"The US presence stands as a barrier in the face of armed militias who want to provoke the country into civil war," says Tareq Ibrahim, a Baghdad-based engineer.
Others said that "independence" is the key to control the security situation but added that Iraq was torn between a continued military occupation and the subsequent loss of sovereignty, and a possible disintegration into total chaos if the US was to withdraw its troops.
"We have to depend on ourselves," says 23-year-old Wissam Mohamed."But how could our weaponless forces stand against armed militias?"
In oil-rich Kirkuk, a disputed northern territory shared between Kurds and Turkmen, a gamut of opinions accompanied the idea of possible US troop reduction or even withdrawal.
Abdullah Hamoud al-Rayashy, a local farmer, said that the US surge "did not create a tangible change."
"There's more terrorism, more arrests, kidnappings, deportation. The Bush administration has failed to change the government programme after Iraqi politicians proved their failure," he said.
A shop owner from Kirkuk, Aras Khorshid, told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa that the US administration did not solve problems, but described the possibility of withdrawal or a reduction in the US presence as a "disaster for Iraq."
He believes that the Americans are playing a negative role in the arguments over who should control Kirkuk - Kurds or Sunni Arabs and Turkmen.
But a withdrawal could mean more infiltration and shelling at the borders by neighbouring Iran and Turkey, according to Khorshid. Turksand Iranians are wreaking havoc in the autonomous Kurdish region while the government doesn't act, he says.
The armies of both Turkey and Iran have been engaged in a conflict with around 7,000 Kurdish rebels who are entrenched in the mountainous frontier region in northern Iraq.
Villages in northern Iraq have been shelled as militants belonging to the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), outlawed in Turkey, and theParty for Freedom and Life in Kurdistan (PJAK) from Iran, are constantly targeted.
"The Americans should exercise pressure (on the Iraqis) to overhaul the army and police sources," said Omar Ouji, a Turkman."Meanwhile, they should slowly and gradually decrease their presence."
Accusations of violence have been levelled at Iraqi police and army forces whose ranks are believed to be infiltrated by members of sectarian militias.
Security elements, which ideally act as a source of protection, bear allegiances to different political factions and are said to have contributed to fomenting violence.
Meanwhile, during the two-day hearing General Petraeus is expected to try and curtail major moves to cut the number of US troops in Iraq in the forthcoming months. Democratic lawmakers in Congress have been pushing for a timetable for the US forces' withdrawal as Bush and his backers continue to warn against premature cuts.
The architect of this year's so-called surge, Petraeus is suggesting that only one brigade, about 4,000 troops, could go back home in December without being replaced but that larger cuts should wait until recommendations on such adjustments are presented in March 2008, according to the New York Times on Monday.
His surge, which only reached full strength during the summer, has reportedly produced some improvements in security in parts of Iraq,especially in and around Baghdad where the US-backed Fard al-Qanoun (Law Enforcement) security plan was put into effect.
However, amid growing debate on the degree of success and failure in Iraq, the Democrats want statistics.
Bush hinted at the possibility of withdrawal during a recent trip to Anbar province.
"When we begin to draw down, it will be from a position of strength and success, not from fear and failure," the US president said.
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