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Two Yemenis, one German, and one Iraqi youths, allegedly with AQAP, begin their trial from the inside of a metal cage. They are charged of planning attacks and sabotage against government and foreign interests in Yemen - page 3.

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Sunday, Sep 26, 2010Volume 01 - ISSue 15

PrIce: yer 30

www.natIonalyemen.comNationalYemenThe Facts As They Are

Hope for Madness in Yemen

Al Qaeda in Abyan :A Tripartite Narrative

Third Government Oil Price Rise

Air Bridges, Floating Hotels of Gulf 20 04 06 08 10

UN News Some of the people forced

to flee their homes in YemenFresh fighting between

Government forces and mili-tants has driven thousands of people from their homes in south-east Yemen, the United Nations refugee agency said yesterday, voicing hope that all possible measures are being taken to prevent casualties among civilians.

The UN High Commis-sioner for Refugees (UNHCR) estimates that the violence has forced at least 4,000 Yemenis to flee from Al-Hawtah village and surrounding settlements, some 400 kilometres from Aden.

“Reports indicate that dis-placement continues to grow,” agency spokesperson Andrej Mahecic told reporters yester-day in Geneva.

Most of the uprooted are seeking safety and shelter in neighbouring villages, while UNHCR’s reception centre, where new arrivals from the Horn of Africa are registered, is some 30 kilometres away in Mayfa’a.

A UNHCR local partner reached Al-Azzem village ear-lier this week, reporting that displaced people are sheltering with host families. The local school is accommodating doz-ens of people.

Initial reports also indicate that some of the uprooted are in urgent need of humanitarian as-sistance, mainly food, shelter and medical supplies.

UNHCR is in close contact with Yemeni authorities, who have already begun distributing aid, as well as with other hu-manitarian agencies on the ground.

A UN team is carrying out a

rapid assessment mission today to more accurately establish the size of displacement and iden-tify immediate needs. UNHCR and other agencies are pre-posi-tioning aid for 300 families – or 2,100 people – at the Mafya’a reception centre.

“We are poised to scale up our assistance should that be-come necessary,” Mr. Mahecic said. “We have considerable re-sources in the country due to the continuing refugee flow from the Horn of Africa and in-ternal displacement caused by last year’s conflict in the north of the country.”

Nearly 170,000 Somali ref-ugees have been registered by UNHCR in Yemen while more than 300,000 Yemenis are still uprooted following the seven-month conflict between Gov-ernment troops and Al Houthi rebels.

The first ministerial meet-ing of the Friends of Yemen (FoY) group took place in New York yesterday, chaired jointly by Yemen, U.K. and KSA.

The meeting represented 28 participating countries and intergovernmental organiza-tion, comprising of the EU, the World Bank and UN ,that aimed to develop strategic solutions for the critical situation Yemen is facing.

Following the London summit on January in 2010 and the inauguration conference on March, the New York ministe-rial meeting sought to officially offer the opportunity for all concerned nations to discuss economic, social and govern-mental resolutions for Yemen.

Leading the assembly were William Hague, UK Foreign Secretary; Abu Bakr Al Qirbi, Yemen Foreign Minister, and; HE Prince Turki as KSA Depu-ty Foreign Minister.

FoY was formed in the wake of a failed bomb attack against a Detroit-bound airliner on Christmas 2009. The forum has set as its priority the neces-sity to help the Yemen to build its stability and support its de-velopment.

Terrorism and disorder in the country are directly linked with poverty and lack of gov-

ernmental efficiency in manag-ing the State.

“If we can stop Yemen be-coming at its most extreme a new Afghanistan or a Somalia or a collapsing state, then I think we will have done the world a favour,” claimed Mr. Alan Duncan, British Minister of State for International De-velopment who previously vis-ited Yemen and attended the Friday meeting.

The Yemeni government has pledged full cooperation in fighting Al-Qaeda, resolving the Southern Movement con-flict, and establishing and main-taining lasting peace with the Houthi rebel group in the North of Yemen.

HE Prime Minister of Qa-tar, Sheikh Hamad bin Jassim bin Jabor Al Thani, announced Foreign Ministers Discuss

A bus carrying state securi-ty officers was ambushed yes-terday early morning by small arms fire, inside Sana’a. The government is accusing Al-Qa-eda.

The officers were attacked in front of the political security complex in the Madhbah dis-trict of Sana’a. Medical sources say that the bus had suffered

small arms fire on both sides, as it was about to enter the com-plex. The bus wreckage was later moved into the compound.

The injured officers were taken to the Republic / Al-Jom-houri Hospital in Sana’a for medical treatment. There are conflicting reports as to how many were injured or killed. The most corroborated reports suggest that the driver suffered

serious injuries and is in a criti-cal condition, and approximate-ly six others were injured.

The government is accus-ing Al Qaeda of perpetrating the attack. However, at this mo-ment, there is no indication or evidence that the ambushers have been caught, or even iden-tified. No further details have been officially acknowledged at this moment in time.

SANA’A, Sep.25 (Saba)- Yemen and European Union (EU) discussed on Saturday fi-nal procedures for opening a re-gional center in Sana’a to coor-dinate and share information to combat sea piracy in the west-ern Indian Ocean area and the Gulf of Aden off the coast of Somali.

This came during a meeting gathered Minister of Transport Khaled al-Wazir and the inter-national expert on security poli-cy and maritime safety at the European Union (EU), Admiral Hubert de Gaullier, and Direc-tor of program to achieve stabil-ity at the European Commission in Sana’a.

The two sides agreed on procedures for receiving mod-ern technical equipments of the center, which its procedures are being completed by the Interna-tional Maritime Organization (IMO). They identified the be-ginning of the next year as the date for opening the center, and next December for arrival of the equipments required for run-ning the center.

Talks in the meeting dealt with arrangements for conven-ing the regional meeting of member States of Djibouti Code of Conduct, to be held in Sana’a during November 6-8, 2010, to discuss the approval of the re-gional center’s administrative system and the mechanism of cooperation between the region-al center and the national cen-ters in 11 member states, which include Yemen, Saudi Arabia, Oman, Eritrea, Djibouti, Sudan, Kenya, Egypt, Somalia, Tanza-nia, and Jordan.

Al-Wazir confirmed Ye-men’s keenness to find urgent and effective solutions for the maritime piracy problem in co-operation with the region coun-tries and the IMO and the inter-national community. He reviewed steps and procedures taken for implementing Ye-men’s obligations in the Code of Conduct.

He commended the support of the EU and the IMO to the regional center, stressing the importance of supporting the Coastguard and Navy of Yemen

so as to enable them to combat the sea piracy that has increased in unprecedented way.

The EU’s officials ex-pressed their satisfaction with the rapid actions taken by the government, represented by the Ministry of Transport, regard-ing the completion of the re-gional center to strengthen re-gional and international cooperation to combat acts of piracy and protect the interna-tional shipping lines.

They confirmed the readi-ness of the EU to continue to provide the technical support for the center to perform its tasks optimally, noting the im-portance of coordinating efforts to reduce the phenomenon of piracy.

They pointed out that the EU would assist Yemen’s ef-forts in this regard in coordina-tion with the IMO.

In recent years, Somali pi-rates have stepped up their at-tacks against merchant vessels off Somalia, threatening one of Yemen, EU discuss procedures for

Yemeni security forces guard the street in the southern city of Aden

Yemeni authorities freed 82 prisoners detained during anti-government protests in the south in a step towards imple-menting an accord sealed with the opposition, a local official told AFP on Wednesday.

“Eighty-two prisoners were freed in Al-Mukalla,” the main city in the southeastern prov-ince of Hadramawt, “on the or-ders of President Ali Abdullah Saleh after the deal was signed with the opposition,” the offi-cial said.

All of those released have “participated in protests” in support of Yemen’s Southern Movement, the official added, referring to a coalition of groups with demands ranging from greater autonomy to full independence for the south.

The agreement to embark on a national dialogue was signed on Saturday with the op-position Common Forum, which groups the main Islamist opposition -- Al-Islah (Reform) -- the Yemen Socialist Party -- which was once the ruling fac-tion in the formerly indepen-dent south -- as well as other

smaller groups.It focuses on mechanisms

to implement a February 2009 accord for national dialogue and the postponement of a par-liamentary election until April 2011 to allow time to amend Yemen’s constitution and re-structure its political system.

The Yemeni president said on Saturday that the new agree-ment was “a positive step to-wards political detente.” Saleh also renewed calls for the oppo-sition to join a national unity government.

Foreign Ministers Discuss International Stance on Yemen Sana’a: Political Security Officers Ambushed

Yemen, EU discuss procedures for opening regional anti-piracy center

Clashes Spark New Displacement in Southern Yemen

Continued on ( 3 )

Continued on ( 3 )Continued on ( 3 )

Mohammed Al-Qiyari

48th anniversary celebration of the 26th September Yemeni Revolution

Jihan Anwar, N.Y

Yemen frees 82 southern prisoners

UK Foreign Secretary , Mr. William Hague, at Friends of Yemen meeting

Sunday, Sep 26, 2010 Issue 15 www.nationalyemen.com2 National YemenCONGRATULATIONS

Sunday, Sep 26, 2010 Issue 15 www.nationalyemen.com 3National Yemen LOCAL

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National Yemen

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Fakhri Hassan Al-ArashiPublisher & Chief Editor

Mohammed Al-AsaadiEditorial Consultant

Mansoor Al-RdaeiNews Editor

Fuad Al-QadhiBusiness Editor

Dr. Ahmed Al-QoyadhiEducation Editor

Najla’a Al-ShaibaniSocial Editor

Ali lah AjlanIT Editor

Wardah Al-shaweshGraphic Designer

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Khaled Al-SofiSeniorTranslator

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Hind Al-EryaniP.R & Marketing

Jihan AnwarStaff Journalist

Friends of Our Future

There is no doubt that the entire world is looking to Yemen as a major partner in fighting ter-rorism due to its strategic loca-tion in the red sea, gulf of Aden and as neighbour in the Arabian peninsula, and to the Horn of Af-rica, and therefore some of the poorest countries in the world too.

Yemen has been accused of being a major source of terrorism since September 11th , and other terrorist attacks within Yemen and elsewhere in the world. Pov-erty and lacklustre education has played a major role in attracting younger generations from Yemen to train them, in the name of fighting the enemies of Muslims everywhere in the world, in a holy mission that may lead them to paradise at the grizzly end.

This danger has affected ev-ery one and Yemen has been af-fected many times by this radical mentality. Subsequently, there were many euphemisms for help-ing Yemen overcome a perceived looming catastrophe.

The Friends of Yemen is one

of these names. American, Brit-ish and gulf countries are the players in drawing methods and developing strategies, as well as key financial partners.

Yemen is also suffering from terrorism itself; it is a battle field with Yemeni victims too. Since the first conference of the Friends of Yemen in London last January till Friday’s meeting in New York, there has been little sub-stantial progress, and terrorism remains on a gradual increase.

Fighting terrorism should not mean pledging more many for military. Combating terror-ism, with a long term view, re-quires extensive employment op-portunities, proper education, a robust economy, financial trans-parency (in all sectors) and full application of the proper writ of justice.

I believe that the gradual fuel increase is part of Yemen’s redi-rection towards a better future, but I wonder who is truly bears the brunt of this increase: every-one in the country, or just the common citizen? On the other hand, I believe people would be satisfied with truly successful changes that would help us with-stand the current inhospitable economic crises.

Friends of Yemen, your role should not be to simply throw money at a security problem, but to build the infrastructure here, to make us a more resilient and capable country, and instead to bring a serious investment to Ye-men. Through that, you should not merely create jobs in security, but rather, secure jobs for people, and a future for Yemen.

Fakhri al-ArashiPublisher & Chief Editor

The Criminal Court, head-ed by Judge Ridhwan Al-Nam-er with the presence of the chief prosecutor, judge Mohammed Abdul-Raqib Al-Himyariand the defendants, held its first ses-sion for the trial of four people accused of belonging to Al-Qa-eda.

The four defendants were:1 - Badr Ahmed Rashed Al-

Husseini, a Yemeni national.2 - Saddam Ali Abdullah

Saleh Al-Raimi, a Yemeni na-tional.

3 - Rami Hens Hermoz, a German national with a Ger-man father and a Yemeni moth-er.

4 - Abdullah Mosa’ed Ab-dul-Aziz Al-Rawi,15, an Iraqi national.

The defendants were indict-ed during the period from 2008 to 2010 and were alleged to have participated in a conspira-cy to commit criminal acts of targeting tourists, foreign inter-ests, vital government struc-

tures and military facilities. They were also indicted of

confronting the State in the governorate of Ma’rib, endan-gering the safety and security of society and that they had the will to carry out those tasks by training on weapons and form-ing of secret cells and their will-ingness to carry out the tasks entrusted to them in suicide at-tacks, as per the details men-tioned in the case file.

Such acts are punishable in articles 31, 129, 133, and 134 of the Republican Decree No. 12 of 1994, regarding crimes and penalties.

As per the implementation of Article (221) Criminal Pro-ceedings, the public prosecu-tion brought the defendants mentioned above before the competent Criminal Court for trial to be sentenced to the max-imum penalty prescribed by law and the confiscation of their seized belongings.

When confronted with the

charges against them, the de-fendants denied the charges en-tirely. One of the defendants even said that he was recruited and assigned by the Political Security to go to Marib to meet with Al-Qaeda and provide the Political Security Office with key information on what was going on.

The German defendant re-quested that the German Em-bassy coordinate his release, and return him to his German father, whom he has not seen

for 16 years. The lawyer of the defen-

dants, Faisal Al-Majeedi, de-manded a copy of the case file so that he could present his de-fense at the next hearing.

At the end of the hearing the judge decided to continue confronting the defendants with the charges against them in the next hearing and allowing for equal distribution of the case files for the defendants’ attor-neys. The case was adjourned until next week.

The Criminal Prosecution a preliminary hearing session with the journalist Abdul Elah Haidar, a specialist in the affairs of Al-Qaeda, was held on Sun-day 19th September 2010.

According to the recom-mendation of the National Se-curity, he was confronted with charges of plotting sabotage, criminal acts affecting the secu-rity and integrity of the country, and providing information for the Al-Qaeda leadership.

The hearing session was at-tended by the Secretary General of the Yemeni Journalists Syn-dicate in addition to lawyers

Khalid Al-Mawiri and Abdel-Rahman Barman from Allaw Foundation, a law firm. The lawyers requested the immedi-ate release of journalist Abdul Elah Haidar, as there is no risk related to releasing him, with the guarantee of his place of residence.

The prosecution acknowl-edged the request, but post-poned making a decision about it until a later stage.

The Secretary General of the Yemeni Journalists Syndi-cate demanded that Haidar must be seen by a forensic doctor to ascertain the state of his health

and investigate the bruises and wounds that are clearly visible on him.

In the investigation session, Haidar exercised the right to re-main silent and not answer questions from the prosecution. He later stressed that he is still subjected to interrogation ses-sions by the Political Security that last for hours. During some of which he reports that he has lost consciousness.

The lawyers registered their objection of those sessions. Hai-dar also showed the lawyers the bruises in different parts of his body sustained during his arrest

and detainment, as well as frac-tured teeth.

Hatiham also complained about having been subjected to psychological torture in deten-tion, and incommunicado de-tainment, as well as delivery of false information to him and de-priving him of access to ade-quate food for the whole of his detention.

He said he had not been al-lowed anything but water and dates for more than thirty days. According to a doctor who has recently checked him in prison, Haidar is suffering from ane-mia.

The review of the political caricaturist, Kamal Kamal Sharaf, who was also arrested with Haidar, was delayed until tomorrow, Monday.

It is expected, according to Yemeni law, that the request to release both will ruled upon no later than next Tuesday. In case the prosecution decides not to release them, it is anticipated that they will be transferred next Tuesday to the State Security Court and a request of an exten-sion period of their confinement for adequate investigation.

Sharaf and Haidar were ar-rested on the sixth of Ramadan,

or 16th August 2010, by two se-curity units belonging to Na-tional Security, who stormed into their homes in Sana’a and took them to the agency’s prison where they stayed, without ac-knowledgement.

The Criminal Prosecution (the State Security Prosecution) confirmed on 22nd August 2010 that the arrest of journalist Ab-dul Elah Haidar and caricaturist Kamal Sharaf was carried out upon its orders, but the National Security refused to allow their visit or giving any details about their health conditions.

Al-Qaeda Suspect Trial

AQAP Specialist Journalist Trial Begins

International Stance on Yemen ( from Page1)

that the GCC country would allocate a special fund to recon

struct the conflict-affected areas in Sa’ada. Qatar also host-ed peace talks between the gov-ernment and the Houthi group in Doha last month.

Two international working groups were chosen chaired by Germany and UAE for “Econo-my and Governance” and the Netherlands and Jordan for “Justice and Rule of Law”, which were assigned to analyze and report on the respective subjects in Yemen.

The conference evaluated the progress of the last eight months in the country. The chairmen noted that there had been encouraging advance-ments represented by the accep-tance of the government of ap-

plying a strict IMF reform, the reduction in fuel subsi-

dization, the development in the WTO negotiations to in-clude Yemen and the ceasefire since February 2010 in the Northern region.

Future strategies were also discussed for a 2011-15 Devel-opment Plan.

Yemen representatives agreed to contribute to sustain a fair multi-party execution of the next elections, with a National Dialogue to be hold with the opposition. Moreover, accords more directly aimed at social development were outlined to boost and improve the Techni-cal and Vocational Training sector and to tackle the Water Scarcity in the region.

A ten year development plan was designed for the Ye-meni coastguard and the Mari-time Information Center to of-

fer a better protection to the country.

Since bribery is a major is-sue in Yemen, a ‘First Extrac-tive Industries Transparency Initiative’ report regarding cor-ruption in the oil sector, was programmed to be produced and validated on February 2010 when a second ministerial level meeting has been scheduled in the Saudi city of Riyadh.

The Friends of Yemen pro-cess has the potential to become an important step toward the progress of the country, yet concerned organizations advise a watchful eye at the political and human violations perpetrat-ed by the government. While the meeting was taking place in New York, a group of human right activists collected to pro-test outside the hosting build-ing.

Since the ‘Counter-Terror-

ism” policy was put in play by the Saleh administration, a con-cerning number of human rights violations have been reported on in the country.

Human Rights Watch stated in early April that media repre-sentatives, political dissidents and protesting civilians were summarily jailed, often tortured and repeatedly intimidated by the national security. People were arrested or detained with-out any clear proof of their guilt on the ground that they were al-legedly “endangering the na-tional security”.

The International Federa-tion for Human Rights –FIDH wrote an open letter suggesting Head of States and Ministers present at the meeting to “re-think international support for Yemen by placing human rights at the forefront of the agenda”.

opening regional anti-piracy center(Page1)

the world’s busiest water-ways in the region.

2008 witnessed the large number of recorded attacks that reached more than 140 in-cidents, out of which 42 hi-jackings.

In 2009, about 46 hijack-ings were registered along with 210 attempted pirate attacks, while 2007 was the year of less pirate attacks and attempted hi-jackings, with only 20 inci-

dents registered. The surge drew the world’s

attention with countries topped by the U.S., the European Union, Russia, China, Japan and others whose ships pass in the region dispatching anti-pi-rate missions into the region.

Many pirates were arrested and handed to Yemen. Some of those handed went on trial in Yemen, getting sentences after confessing to hijacking and at-tempted pirate attacks.

Yemen frees 82 southern prisoners ( from Page1)

In May, he invited all po-litical groups inside and out-side Yemen to a “responsible national dialogue, within the framework of constitutional in-stitutions.”

Officials in the region esti-mate that some 300 southern activists are in custody.

South Yemen was indepen-dent from British withdrawal from the region in 1967 until it

united with the north in 1990. The south seceded in 1994, sparking a short civil war that ended with the region overrun by northern troops.

Residents of the south, who complain of discrimina-tion by the Sanaa government in the allocation of resources, have held repeated protests in recent months, periodically re-sulting in deadly clashes.

Sunday, Sep 26, 2010 Issue 15 www.nationalyemen.com4 National YemenREPORT

“Hi, I’m Mansoor,” he in-troduced himself lending his hand friendly, “Mansoor Al Ma-jnoon [Mad Mansoor]!” the charismatic man added with a bright smile.

Mansoor is terribly young and at first sight might be diffi-cult to detect his illness; you could have thought he was kid-ding had you met him in a place other than a psychiatric clinic.

Al Amal Hospital, in Sana’a, is the principal and most equipped psychiatric hospital in the region, with an availability of 200 beds to hospitalize pa-tients compared to the average 20-40 present in the other men-tal care centers in Yemen.

Mansoor is one of the 170 patients currently housed who are undergoing treatment. De-spite the major frequency of oc-currence of mental illnesses in women, in average there are only 30 of them as inpatients.

A few cases have found their only home in the hospital since no parent was willing to provide for them, stated Iazen Al-Qais, the clinic administra-tor. He explains that the clinic was originally an orphanage and switched to female mental center in 1991, while the males section saw its inauguration in 2004. Today it’s run jointly by a private and public system joint-ly.

Typically, duration of clini-cal stays ranges from a mini-mum of two weeks till an exten-sion of up to three months.

The most recurrent psycho-logical diseases in Yemen are psychotic problems accounting

for 46% of all patients at Al-Amal, followed by mood disor-ders and neurotic issues (anxi-ety, depression and hypochondria) at 27% and 17% respectively.

The Psychiatric Center also has a separate department to re-ceive less severe cases, such as those requiring counselling, psychoanalytic therapies or drug prescription. Of course, sometimes, people just need to be listened to and have the op-portunity to relieve themselves from the weight of the daily pre-occupations and responsibili-ties, explained a nurse.

The capital city of Sana’a ranks first in term of mental cas-es, followed by Sana’a gover-

norate, Ibb and recently conflict affected areas such as Amran and Sa’adah have seen an in-crease of mental disorders due to posttraumatic disorders or war related experiences.

The precarious condition of health care in Yemen unfortu-nately also extends to the field of mental health, where psycho-logical disorders are poorly treated and, more alarmingly, are hardly recognized by people as illnesses that a cure or treat-ment must be sought cure for.

Dr. Mohammad Amer, a psychologist operating in the Al Amal hospital, states that usu-ally patients resort to hospital treatment only after a long peri-od of doubt and hesitancy when their psychological condition has worsened and somehow af-fected their daily life.

This fact alone seriously jeopardizes the chance of a complete and prompt recovery for the majority of patients, and nullifies the potential of pre-venting the onset of the psychi-atric disorder by treating it after indications from its early symp-toms.

The delayed approach to specialized mental care has var-ious underlining causes. Among them are economical issues-a prescription drug could cost up to 40 thousand dollars; distance from or inexistence of psychiat-ric facilities in the area; skepti-cism toward modern medicine and a general ignorance towards psychological illnesses and its symptoms. A ulterior significant cause for postponing treatment is the social stigma associated to mental problems, which are viewed as a shame, for the indi-vidual and their family.

Families are quite against letting their kin, daughters espe-cially, living outside their house and make public the presence of a mental case amongst their family. In general, an ill indi-vidual is kept at home, often prevented from venturing out-side and kept locked in the house or in a particular room if guests are expected for the fear that s/he would behave in an embarrassing or inappropriate way in front of strangers.

It would only seem logical that these very families, the ones that are most concerned by psychological conditions, should be the very ones hurry-ing to psychiatric hospitals at-tempting to cure their loved ones in the fastest time, but the risks that elatives could be for-ever labelled as insane is a real and serious concern that pre-vents the majority. Besides this, of course, only a minority are informed about the presence of therapies.

It’s quite unique that claim-ing to be possessed by an evil spirit is more acceptable and sympathized with by Yemeni society than openly admitting to be suffering from mental disor-ders.

A practitioner at the mental health facility remarked, “The community seem to automati-cally think that someone who has psychological disorders, re-gardless of the kind or stage of the illness, is hopelessly insane ... a crazy person to keep at dis-tance”. This is a kind of preju-dice that recurs frequently while there is in fact difference be-tween these two terms (crazy and insane).

The term ‘insane’ is used to describe people who are ren-dered incompetent by a psychi-atric illness; it’s derived from the Latin word ‘insanus’ mean-

ing ‘unhealthy’. Whereas the term ‘crazy’ was borrowed from a middle English term meaning cracked, referring to someone behaving in a particularly irra-tional manner.

In Arabic a term commonly adopted to address people with mental dysfunctions is Majnoon (e.g. Mansoor Al-Majnoon).

The root letters (which dictate the general meaning of all deri-vations of the word in Arabic) are jeem and noon, and together they read jann. Etymologically related Arabic words include jinn-demon, jannah-paradise, janeen-embryo and jnoon-mad-ness.

Since time immemorial the underlying causes of mental diseases were related to super-natural and physiological events. Certain Chinese philos-ophies maintained that uneven-ness between Yin and Yang was responsible for mind corrup-tion. The ‘imbalance’ theory is a factor cited by numerous cul-tures throughout times and loca-tions.

In an ancient Indian book describing aspects believed to be leading to psychological problems were included unbal-anced diet, unhealthy life style and the absence of a spiritual fulfilment due to weak relation-ships with God.

Greeks also put forward the ‘tetra humorous’ hypothesis: the disproportion in the interaction between these four fluids in the body was pointed as the princi-pal reason for mental deficien-cy.

The Islamic doctrine too promotes moderation and bal-ance in every aspect of the indi-vidual life, carefully regulating or providing solutions for every detail of it. Any imbalance, ex-cess or extremism regarding nu-trition, self-concerning and so-cial behaviour as well as connection with God, is viewed as sufficient in Islam to lead to mental disorders.

The first Muslim scholar re-jecting the culturally accepted view of patients suffering from mental issues as possessed by Jinns was Ibn Sina, known in the west more commonly as Avicenna – the medieval Mus-lim Persian polymath, who the-orised the necessity to consider mental disorder as real illnesses demanding appropriate treat-ments, instead of strange exor-cism ceremonies. As a matter of fact, the first psychiatric hospi-tals were built in the Muslims cities of Baghdad (705), Cairo (800) and Damascus (1270).

In Yemen medical institu-tions repeatedly lament that ill patients are referred to hospitals only after their mental and physical health has been severe-

ly compromised by all sorts of exploitation by a common phe-nomena of a village witchdoctor practice, calling himself a Sheikh.

‘Traditional’ cures are pre-ferred to therapies; unfortunate-ly these so-called remedies usu-ally cause further damage to the already unstable mind of the person. Culture has dictated that the exorcist should be sought before any medical institution for what has become quite a lu-crative business for profit seek-ing frauds who authorize them-selves through pseudo-religious reference.

Religious reference, how-ever, is a source of complemen-tary treatment in Yemen. Qur’anic recitation is known to sooth and calm restless or dis-turbed thoughts, but resorting to unholy prescriptions of potions, amulets, spells and rituals is considered by proper religious authorities as an act of heresy, since the Qur’an clearly re-minds Muslims that if they rely on an inanimate object or the “supernatural skills” of another human being.

Recitation of verses fron the Qura’an, and a revival of Iman (Islamic faith) are supposedly particularly effective. There is a clear connection between weak-ening of faith and mental disor-ders. Also, studies have proven that suicidal thoughts, depres-sion and lasting anxiety were seldom experienced by a firm follower of any religion.

To cite some practical ex-amples, in depression some common beliefs are worthless-ness, self-denigrating ideas and desperation. In a psychotic sub-type of depression, the individu-al has delusions of being guilty of unpardonable sins and is tor-mented by a constant sense of insecurity. Firm belief, they say, would absolve such feelings.

At the very core of the Is-lamic message sits the concept of the great purpose of humani-ty in this world as worshippers of God through good acts and righteousness and that human beings are the most sublime and honoured of the creations, espe-cially valuing their ability to think and be self-conscious.

Furthermore, a recurrent theme is to seek forgiveness since every single sin will be forgiven to a repentant soul and that none but unbelievers will despair. Also countering the feeling of insecurity, men are reminded that nothing happens except by the will of the Creator and nothing can harm them nor benefit them except by His pow-er, and they should fear no one but Him. A persons firmly be-lieving and acting along such premises could not ever feel de-pressed.

In the case of schizophre-nia, researchers noticed that there were several common fac-tors - other than biological ones - that made individual more vul-nerable to the onset of the disor-der. It should be known, how-ever, that the fact that substance abuse is the main responsible for schizophrenic manifestation in 50% of the cases.

Although intoxicants are il-legal in Yemen, there have been registered cases of psychologi-cal disorders attributable to al-cohol and drug addiction. Addi-tionally, qat, which has energizing properties, is chewed generally by teens in combina-tion with sleeping pills. This combination causes hallucina-tions and ‘trips’ that results in a reckless conduct and impaired

judgment.Also, first behavioural signs

that favour the emergence of the illness are poor social skills, ec-centric or odd behaviour, re-duced self-care and heightened paranoia.

From both the Qura’an and the Sunnah of the Prophet (PBUH) a great emphasis is giv-en in minding our character as a prerogative on restraining from any extreme or eccentric behav-iour.

Self-care is a must in Islam in which every Muslim should always maintain his tidiness and hygiene, especially when pray-ing. This directive is applied, for example, through the obliga-tory wuduh (or mandatory ablu-tions before prayer). Suspicion in any form is specifically or-dered to be avoided. Use and abuse of any substance that could remotely impair our minds and judgment is clearly discouraged or forbidden.

In the clinic, qat consump-tion is not allowed because it disturbs the effect of the medi-cines. The patients are seen to improve simply due to the ab-sence of qat, despite their many requests.

Researchers suggest that qat users are more susceptible to developing mental illnesses, at-tributing this to the similarity of the effects of the leaves to those of the amphetamines; others ex-plained the psychological prob-lem to be a consequence of the often household-damaging economy and insomnia caused by chewing habit.

“In some cases their [the patients] degree of addiction to qat moves them to chew the leaves of some of the trees pres-ent in the clinic courtyard”, re-marks Katibah, a hospital work-er. “Some of the patients are unwilling to leave the hospital even after we made understood they were cured on the ground that they feared to return to their chewing routine and be subject of manic disorders”.

Regarding non-genetic ill-nesses their cause is usually a shock, trauma or a particularly stressing life style.

“We actually encourage people to attend Qura’anic reci-

tation as it has proved to be a successful treatment, with the condition that they shouldn’t seek witch-doctor ‘sheikhs’ that take on impressionable ill pa-tients through fighting the af-fecting jinns (demons).”

Islamic religion doesn’t conflict with, or supplant, the medical approach – it comple-ments it. A famous hadith of the Prophet (PBUH) informed us that there is no illness on earth that does not have a cure which we should not try to obtain.

Psychiatric clinics in Ye-men also recognize the positive effects gained by recitation of the Qur’an and countless are the anecdotes of patients cured by it.

The WHO strategy for Global Health by 2000 ac-knowledged the importance of spirituality for a sane and bal-anced life. What both Islam and mental health professionals de-spise are witch doctors who pre-tend to healings, often extorting their naive patients who trust too blindly.

A medical cure and profes-sional treatment should be sought, but the patient should bear in mind that the ultimate power resides with God.

Psychological treatment is largely an ignored possibility or a misunderstood matter. Conse-quently, mentally ill patients are often victims of mental disor-ders and social prejudice.

Often, traditional healing is confused with Islamic prescrip-tions and justified as so. Other-wise rational and learned be-lievers are sometimes doubtful or unsure on how to deal with mental disorders, frequently simply conforming to the unjust ‘traditional’ witch doctor sheikhs.

The solution to prevent this tendency could be quite simple. Knowledge. Awareness rising. More people familiar with the subject would result in a better chance of promoting better pub-lic understanding for a problem that cripples families and com-munities, as well as the individ-ual patients.

Al Amal Psychiatric Hospi-tal might be the place from where a modern understanding of mentality should begin. Al Amal, in Arabic, means ‘hope’, and perhaps its name is even more meaningful to patients like Mansoor, and their fami-lies.

Hope for Madness in YemenJihan Anwar, N.Y

usually patients resort to hospital treatment only after a long period of doubt and hesi-tancy when their psychological con-dition has wors-ened and some-how affected their daily life. This fact alone seriously jeopar-dizes the chance of a complete and prompt recovery for the majority of patients,

It’s quite unique that claiming to be possessed by an evil spirit is more acceptable and sympathized with by Yemeni society than openly admit-ting to be suffering from mental disor-ders.

“We actually en-courage people to attend Qura’anic recitation as it has proved to be a suc-cessful treatment, with the condition that they shouldn’t seek witch-doctor ‘sheikhs’ that take on impressionable ill patients through fighting the af-fecting jinns (de-mons).”

Although intoxi-cants are illegal in Yemen, there have been registered cases of psycho-logical disorders attributable to al-cohol and drug ad-diction. Addition-ally, qat, which has energizing prop-erties, is chewed generally by teens in combination with sleeping pills. This combination causes hallucina-tions and ‘trips’ that results in a reckless conduct and impaired judg-ment.

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Sunday, Sep 26, 2010 Issue 15 www.nationalyemen.com 5National Yemen CONGRATULATIONS

Sunday, Sep 26, 2010 Issue 15 www.nationalyemen.com6 National Yemen

While the central govern-ment and the opposition ex-change spurious claims and charges about the penetration and influence of Al-Qaeda, and their games of political one-up-manship with every such accu-sation, the security situation in Abyan becomes ever more deli-cate and vulnerable to confron-tations. Only the people of Aby-an will suffer the consequences of the rhetoric exchanged on se-curity.

Citizens of Abyan live through a permanent anxiety and fear, in addition to the daily difficulties and high costs of liv-ing, and the difficulty of access to basic necessities of life be-cause of counter-terrorism op-erations.

Even though Abyanis have only known about Al-Qaeda through what they heard from different local and international media a few years ago, they are now required to deal with to-day’s events with extreme cau-tion, especially now that Al-Qa-eda’s doctrine had permeated amongst youth, and most secu-rity incidents are connected with it, as reported by the media of the State.

On this basis, international news outlets have had to ex-plore the views and analyses of a number of intellectuals, politi-cians and ‘experts’ specialized in this issue that disturbs and haunts the people of this gover-norate.

However, despite interna-tional efforts to dig into how this issue originated and its im-pact on security and social peace in Yemen’s governorates, most local leaders refrain from discussing it completely.

In a rare interview however, Abdul-Mejeed Al-Salahi, Mem-ber of the Local Council in the governorate of Abyan, spoke his mind, an insightful, local, narrative, about what was really happening.

Scapegoats & Criminal Culprits

Al-Salahi said, “After the fall of Kabul at the hands of the Afghan resistance that was backed by the West, and after the withdrawal of the Soviet forces in the late eighties of the previous millennium, groups of young Mujahedeen (known as the “Afghan Arabs”) had been amassed.”

“Many were recruited in a number of Arab countries by the CIA in order to fight the tide of Communism into Afghani-stan and into their own coun-tries, including Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Yemen and other countries.”

“Their return to Yemen cre-ated an appropriate opportunity for the regime in Sana’a to con-tain them and use them as a pressure on the leaders of South of Yemen to accelerate the dec-laration of the Yemeni unity, which was achieved on 22 May, 1990.”

He added, “the period after the unity had witnessed a signif-icant administrative and politi-cal and security vacuum, par-ticularly in the southern provinces suffered public dis-content against the Yemeni So-cialist Party regime, which ruled at the time.”

“This encouraged the jihadi groups to launch an attack tacti-cally against the former regime in the south. Training camps were set up with the blessing of the military leadership and the tribal dignitaries.”

“Once the indications of loss of confidence between the two partners in government (the General People’s Congress GPC, and the Yemen Socialist Party YSP), these groups started to execute the scheme of killing the most prominent YSP leaders under the pretext of political vendetta which led to exacerba-tion of the Yemeni crisis, lead-ing to the war in the summer of 1994.”

“These jihadi groups played a prominent role in winning the battle for the forces of legitima-cy, and then entering Aden on 7th July of the same year. That was a new starting point for the work of these groups in terms of unifying their ranks and renew-ing their allegiance to their lead-ers.”

He said, “the war ended with the defeat of the YSP and the fleeing of most of its leaders abroad after being removed from power, which enabled the armed groups to have control over the areas of the YSP, espe-cially Abyan, Shabwah and Lahj and taking into their pos-session some government build-ings and camps, thinking that they will replace the YSP in the

governance of these provinces or to be given a percentage of the taxes from these areas as they were deluded.”

“However, the unexpected happened. Shortly, these groups became target of the military campaigns, especially in Abyan, and some of their leaders be-came wanted for security issues. Amidst these confrontations, new names of jihadi organiza-tions began to surface, such as “the Army of Aden-Abyan, “Shabaab Al-Mujahedeen” and others, and adopted the ap-proach of violence in their dia-logue with the Authority.”

“They began to launch sev-eral attacks on security camps and tourist groups, as is the case with Abu Al-Hassan Almihdhar in the popular incident of kid-napping German tourists in Mudiyah in Abyan province in 1998.”

“These groups expanded their activity to include attacks on Western interests in Yemen like the attack on the destroyer Cole in Aden in October 2000 and the French oil tanker Lim-burg in Hadramout after the events of September 11 in the U.S. Al-Qaeda’s influence grew in Yemen and thereafter large groups returned into the country from Afghanistan, Pakistan and Saudi Arabia to threaten West-ern interests in the region. The Authority’s attempts did not succeed in taking the dialogue course to resolve the crisis.”

“Al-Salahi went on saying, “All of the above forced Al-Qa-eda to operate in another way based on some rugged areas of tribal influence and the weak-ness of the State’s power in Marib, Abyan and Shabwah af-ter the integration of the Al-Qa-eda’s two organizations in Ye-men and Saudi Arabia.”

“Shortly after that, the new organization “Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula [AQAP]” emerged, which the authorities tried through official media to relate AQAP activity to sabo-tage and criminal highway rob-bery practiced by armed groups that have nothing to do with the Al-Qaeda organization, as is the case in the provinces of Lahj and Abyan.”

“These groups took advan-tage of the chaos and the weak-ness of the local authority to carry out acts of looting, which is still a drama series in place until today. These groups were helped by the activity of certain forces of the so-called the Southern Movement which abandoned its peacefulness and exchanged it with violent and sabotage acts paid for by the provinces of Al-Dhale’, Lahj,

Abyan and Shabwah.” He noted that such acts

would undoubtedly have an im-pact on security and peace. The violent acts that took place in Laudar town during Ramadan bares testament to that; the situ-ation in the towns of Ja’aar, Zin-jobar, Al-Hisn, Batis and others have fared no better.

Those acts prompted large numbers of families to flee to the province of Aden nearby, es-pecially after the incidents of repeated attacks on security men and military check points, in addition to the damage in-flected on the economy, invest-ment and the major service proj-ects whether those belonging to the private sector, such as ce-ment factories, or to the govern-ment projects, such as roads and the Gulf 20.

He said that these acts still raise many questions in the minds of simple citizens such as: Who supports these groups? What is the cause of the weak-ness and vulnerability of the se-curity services? And why is the State unable to disclose the per-petrators of these crimes?

At the end, he wished that the state can impose the prestige of law and order and fight those who disturb the peace and bring the perpetrators of those inci-dents to justice, so that the citi-zens feel secure.

AQAP: The Authorities’ Instrument

Dr. Saudi Ali Obeid, Pro-fessor at the University of Aden, had a different take to Al-Sala-hi. He said, “Historically, ‘po-litical Islamic organisations’ never existed in the south or in Abyan. It certainly hadn’t hap-pened between the beginning of the second half of last century until the beginning of the Re-public of Yemen in 1990, and most especially nothing was seen in the period from the be-ginning of 1950s of last century until Nov 1967, which repre-sents a period of flourishing for political action.”

“Several nationalist, leftist socialist, and local parties ex-isted and the Muslim Brother-hood movement was weak, if not absent. Similarly, we can say that the period between the establishment of South Yemen on November 30, 1967 and May, 1990 was entirely free from the Islamic movements.

By looking at the Yemeni post-unification period we can say that the Islamic movements, both moderate and extreme, had spread to the southern territories that were known as the territory of the Yemen Arab Republic in

particular, a host for the Islamic groups and the different ideolo-gies that had a close relationship with the authorities at the time because they benefited from each other under the terms of the stages of the political ac-tion”

He added, “Because the unified state had been tinged with the content and form of the political system that prevailed in the North, the authorities in Sana’a has been keen to transfer a lot of disadvantages and draw-backs to the South, most impor-tant of which is the transfer of Islamic movements and cur-rents at all levels and ideologies moderate and extremist.”

He added that perhaps ev-erybody knows that Sana’a was one of the regions that was used as a front for supporting and mobilizing the Mujahedeen who participated in the war against the Soviets in Afghani-stan with the blessing of West and U.S.A under the banner of the liberation war from the oc-cupiers.

After the summer of 1994 and ‘the fratricidal war’, the ex-pertise and capacities of the par-ticipants in the war in Afghani-stan were made use of under the

banner of jihad against the “infi-del atheists”, the apostates and communism. Invigorated by duff religious fatwas, these groups took part in the war alongside the forces of Sana’a.

He said, “Wrong begin-nings produce wrong ends. The Afghan war resulted in the es-tablishment of an extremist reli-gious state under the leadership of Taliban and the more politi-cal, religious and more even more radical organization Al-Qaeda. Because atheism and polytheism is not limited to the Soviet Union only, the jihad ob-ligation remained a duty that must be done everywhere. The friends of yesterday are the en-emies of today; Europe and the U.S. have become a target for Al-Qaeda. Afghanistan has be-come a strong ally and a secure haven for Al-Qaeda.”

He added, “The September 11 events were a major cause of the conflict between Taliban Af-ghanistan and Al-Qaeda on the one hand and the US, Europe and their allies on the other hand, and the consequences of that conflict are well known to everyone. When the Taliban re-gime was overthrown and re-placed by another regime, the majority of Al-Qaeda elements made their exit from the country and now our country has been one of those states preferred and safe for many of them.”

He went on to say, “The Sana’a Authority’s close rela-tionship with these groups en-abled it to use them in what it sees appropriate for it, before they fall out. It has been able to control work and activities of these groups, including their movements and elements under the surveillance of the Republi-can Palace in Sana’a.”

“The Authority used them as a tool of pressure on all of those who oppose it; however, the atmosphere of accord be-tween them has soon vanished after a number of various events, which made the authori-ties reconsider the relationship but in following the policy of turning a blind eye on their movements.”

“At this stage we can men-tion two important events: the invasion of Iraq and the South-ern Movement. In the first event, the authority facilitated transportation of many Al-Qae-da elements or those wishing to participate in the jihad against the Americans and their allies in Iraq under the pretext of ji-had against atheist. In the sec-ond event, the situation is com-plicated.”

“The authority underesti-mated the Southern Movement, considering it a temporary event that will end soon. But that did not happen. The authorities used all possible means to elim-inate the movement in the south, which became stronger with the

Al Qaeda in Abyan: Authority Confirms, Opposition Denies

Shukri Hussein, NY Abyan Correspondent

A Tripartite Narrative

Phot

o:Sh

ukri

Hus

sein

Heightened security measures and checkpoints provide an unprecedented disruption and intrusion into the lives of Abyan’s citizens

[I]nternational news outlets have had to explore the views and analy-ses of a number of intellectuals, politi-cians and ‘experts’, ... however, de-spite international efforts to dig into this issue originat-ed and its impact on security and peace in Yemen’s governorates, most local leaders re-frain from discuss-ing it completely.

Wrong beginnings produce wrong ends. The Afghan war resulted in the establishment of an extremist reli-gious state under the leadership of Taliban and the more political, religious and more even more radi-cal organization Al-Qaeda ... The friends of yesterday are the enemies of today.

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EDUCATION

Sunday, Sep 26, 2010 Issue 15 www.nationalyemen.com 7National Yemen EDUCATION

passage of time.”“When the authorities felt

that things might be out of hand, it turned its back to its old / new ally and started to play the tone of the threat of Al-Qaeda in the south. What helped the authori-ty in this respect is the panic of the West in general and the vari-ous European countries from this terrorist organization and their attempts to eliminate it scrutinizing details of where and how.”

“Therefore, the authorities allowed Al-Qaeda elements to move towards the south, but with caution. Thus, it was not surprising that the authority de-clares that it discovered move-ments of Al-Qaeda in a particu-lar area where there is activity of the Southern Movement.”

By doing this, the Authority wants to achieve a number of objectives including: 1) create a permanent state of terror and panic among citizens, particu-larly amongst Southern Move-ment activists, in order to quell it; 2) take control of the area and set up checkpoints where it can

stack the cards and play the rel-evant ones with regard to public and foreign opinion, particular-ly those involved in combating terrorism in order to refrain from giving any positive atti-tudes towards the issue of the South Movement, if not to con-tribute in striking the Move-ment and dumping its cause.

He pointed out that the im-pact and damage of Al-Qaeda is undoubtedly enormous as long as the authorities continue to play this card, which it uses whenever there are crises.

Scorched Earth Policies

Yet another viewpoint from the south of Yemen should be taken into account. Ali Dahmas Ali, a central member of the Ye-meni Socialist Party (YSP), said, “Actually, no one can deny Al-Qaeda’s presence in Yemen in general and its presence was because a number of young Ye-menis went to Afghanistan to fight against the presence of the Soviet Union forces.”

“Some of them received

training there to confront the re-gime in South Yemen before the unity and then their presence doubled after the events of Sep-tember 11. In the 1994 war a lot of them fought against the YSP and the South in general.”

“After the war ended, these groups claimed a number of rights from the victor in return for their standing beside the au-thorities.”

“The conclusion is that Al-Qaeda is largely present, but un-der the control of the authori-ties. That is, it is in harmony and concord with the authorities which use them whenever and however it wants, especially that it facilitated their going abroad to carry out a number of attacks in Iraq and fight against the Americans and some opera-tions against Western interests in Yemen. The most recent of which is the attack on the Brit-ish Embassy almost two years ago.”

He added, “The govern-ment’s claim that Al-Qaeda is present in Abyan is groundless, but there are some jihadist

groups under different names whose purpose was to target and destroy the remaining institu-tions of the State of the South and to target the YSP under the blessing of the Authority which provided them assistance.”

“These operate under the directions of influential civilian and military forces and centers in Sana’a and the Authority has direct contact with these groups and talk with them in presiden-tial palaces and headquarters of security units.”

“A lot of them received generous assistance and were granted buildings and govern-ment institutions in the prov-ince. Perhaps the recent killing of soldiers and the targeting of the headquarters of the political security in the cities of Ja’aar, Zinjubar and Laudar has noth-ing to do with Al-Qaeda. It is well-known Al-Qaeda carries out more prestigious operations, and don’t usually resort to skir-mish attacks against military checkpoints or detonating an explosive device.”

He added, “These groups

have long been in public view, and the authorities know this well. I am confident that there is no such thing as the Al-Qaeda as we are told about. These are just groups operating under the direction of known military and security commanders and we can simply say that the conflict within the government put these groups at risk.”

“Perhaps everyone is fully aware of what the citizens of Laudar town said to the Gover-nor after the recent events. They said, “You know very well that those are not Al-Qaeda ele-ments. They belong to the gov-ernment and they follow certain people in Sana’a. This is utter fallacy.”

Dahmas said, “A very im-portant question is why has the Al-Qaeda presence coincided with the recent events and at this particular time, as the gov-ernment claims. The answer is, certainly, to eliminate the peace-ful rising Southern Movement, especially in central areas of the province (Laudar, Al-Wodhai’, Mudiyah and Mukayras).”

“The Authority wants to suggest to the U.S that the southern provinces have be-come a haven for Al-Qaeda and so it can get approval to strike the Movement under the pretext of combating terrorism. It also wants to invent new ways to beg and request money from the U.S and the European Union under the same pretext.”

“What is more dangerous than that is that the government is not honest in protecting the unity in its national project. The authorities believe that the de-mands of the Southern Move-ment are only claims to rights to national partnership and no more.”

“The Authority has, for some while, resorted to turn the southern provinces to war spots and dispute areas under the pre-text of combating the terror of Al-Qaeda and jihadi groups and to cause rabble-rousing and tribal vendetta. It provided these groups with the necessary weapons for silencing the voice of the South and practicing a policy of ‘scorched earth’.

More than six million stu-dents in all governorates of the Republic, at various levels of public education, in more than 16,000 schools, will return to a new school year in the next few days. The Deputy Education Minister, Dr. Abdullah Al-Hamidi, oversees the 250,000 teachers that will receive them. NY journalist Mohammed Qi-yari interviewed the minister for his appraisal on the situation and its complexities.Q: Teachers and textbooks are the core of Yemen’s education, and the supply of both is notoriously bad. Where have your reached in your ministry’s preparations for the new school year in regards to their distribution?

A: The textbooks have al-ready arrived at the centers of the governorates, districts and schools. You may have noticed that a few minutes ago I signed a field visit assignment to schools and districts to super-vise the availability of teachers and all the textbooks to schools. We are making great effort to do so.

The problem is that some of the students do not register in Ramadan, as directed, and this has affected the precise sched-ule of the educational process where arrangements for regis-tration have to be accommodat-ed after Eid, between 18th and 30th September. Resultantly the schools begin their year late, and we can’t react properly to distributing resources effective-ly. In sha Allah, the educational process will begin to settle this week. Therefore, we will be in the field.Q: Education authorities in rural areas are publically complaining about the lack of teachers and textbooks. What is your response?

A: I assure you that 95% of textbooks have already reached all schools and the remaining 5% will reach schools during the next few days. This is signif-icant progress. In the past it was said that even by the end of the school year the textbooks had not arrived.

However, now we are cer-tain that textbooks have reached schools; if they haven’t, then it is a corruption-related issue. To-day, our supervisory representa-

tives will be present in schools and directorates. Wherever there is something wrong, mea-sures will be taken.

You as media are also the tongue and eyes of the people. You have to notify us of the truth.Q: Absent teachers and a lack of teaching ‘cover’ greatly detriment national education. How will you handle this problem this year?

A: the Ministry of Educa-tion has respected decentraliza-tion and given power to the lo-cal authorities. I’m sure that today there is no shortage of teachers. However, there might be a poor distribution of teach-ers within provinces, districts and schools.

The local authorities are re-sponsible for supervising and monitoring the educational pro-cess as well as the other activi-ties in the provinces and direc-torates. They have to follow up and re-distribute teachers; if there is a surplus in a school, there is a shortage of teachers in another school. Local authori-ties should rethink its policies in this respect.

We, too, are a monitoring body and the local authorities will report to us during this year. We believe that it would be a busy year that is full of achieve-ments and we will follow this process closely.Q: What about the unqualified teaching substitutes?

A: There is no such a thing as replacement. This is a cor-ruption phenomenon. We, in the ministry, disapprove of it total-ly. Why should there be a re-placement for a teacher? This corruption is related to the teacher who brings another per-son to teach instead of him or her. This corruption is teacher-related.

If we received such infor-mation, or we found about it upon our field visits and we did not take action to deal with it, then it would be our responsibil-ity. Today, we have more than 250,000 teachers (male and fe-male), and more than 16,000 schools. Therefore, if there is something wrong anywhere, then it is the responsibility of the local authority. If you saw it and did not report it to us, it

becomes your responsibility. But, who does this? And where does it happen? It is the school.

We warn all school direc-tors and any educational institu-tion from using the replacement system because this is dishon-esty, fraud and cheating.Q: The percentage of passing high school students has dropped, and there are accusations that the ministry has skewed the results in order to be allocated more funds. There have been reports of student suicides because of poor marks – what is the ministry’s position?

A: The high school results that have been announced are true, that’s first.

Second, before, we had been accused of raising the grades to pass students; today, we are accused of decreasing them. This is a very serious so-cial and moral issue. Why would I betray myself and my mission by reducing the grade of a student and raising the grade of another?

We neither intervene in raising grades nor do we inter-vene in decreasing them. These are false rumors. I am the chair-man of the Supreme Committee of Examinations and during the whole period of the process of scoring the exam papers, I was monitoring and watching.

No one can add or decrease because the scoring process happens through coded num-bers. When the result comes out as 80%, people say we have in-creased the percentage for stu-dents to pass. When they hear that it is 69%, they say we have decreased it. This is false infor-mation, and I consider this issue a menace to society.Q: What about the suicide attempts?

A: What happens in any so-ciety must be analyzed. I have haven’t heard about these stu-dent suicides before. I have just heard it from you, but let’s as-sume that they exist; in this case, they must be studied and analyzed. They may be psycho-logically related. There might be family problems that led to the unfortunate suicide. Or it could be related to failure in learning. This issue must be an-alyzed before we cast blame.

Q: We have heard that you are going to change the marking system from the traditional 20 point rating system. What are the new procedures going to be?

A: This year we found that the students ignore revising their lessons and study through-out the year because they only both learning for the final ex-ams, which begin in July of the second year. They would rather relax and exert little effort in learning, until immediately be-fore their final exams. When they fail, they invent excuses and justifications.

This year, we have come out with the solution that both the preparatory and secondary school students will sit for two exams: a mid-year exam and a final exam. Now, they are equal with their colleagues in all dif-ferent stages. The advantages of these two exams are that the grades of both exams will be in-cluded in the final grade.

Also, the students will con-tinue to learn and revise for both exams. Therefore, they will be ready for the final exams when they are due. There will be no marks granted to them by the ministry. The students have to work hard. This is a chance for them. As long as the students are present at school and follow up their lessons regularly, we

expect that the results would be better this year.

We will make sure that no student sits for the final exam this year, which will begin in June 20th for the preparatory school and June 21st for the sec-ondary school, unless s/he takes the two exams (the mid and fi-nal) at school.

Learning is the basis for success, not the grades. The stu-dents have to earn marks through hard work. I believe that the results will be better this year and through your newspa-per, I call on all the students to study hard.Q: What about teaching standards. Is training adequate?

A: We hold training work-shops for teachers. The schools which do not have unqualified teachers are supposed to give them training. We have inten-sive training programs.

We had come out with a plan that the teacher do not come to Sana’a or to training centers but rather they go to a ‘pivotal’ school. That is to say, for every seven schools there is an eighth school nearby (the pivot school), will be the train-ing center for all the teachers of the eight schools during the whole year. By following this plan we will have trained and reached all teachers.Q: The Ministry of Education

holds the responsibility of building the country’s academic ability, public knowledge and general education standards for the coming generations. However, the level of learning is weak. Why?

A: There are several rea-sons. Some of these reasons are: the luxury of satellite channels distracts students (and their par-ents) from studying. Also, the schools and classrooms are overcrowded with students – we are struggling to meet an un-even population boom.

Nevertheless, the proce-dures we are following are meant to improve the quality of education. If there is something wrong, we should not turn a blind eye to it - we’d better fix it.Q: Do you have a message for students’ parents?

A: The students’ parents must follow up their children day by day and support them throughout the year. If the stu-dents as well as the parents con-tinue their daily follow-up, the students will need no corrective action from us. We hope that all our students get 90% because eventually they are the future of this country. We do not inten-tionally increase or decrease grades. The media has to dis-seminate this information hon-estly.

New School Year, New StandardsMohammed Al-Qiyari

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Sunday, Sep 26, 2010 Issue 15 www.nationalyemen.com8 National YemenCONGRATULATIONS

Sunday, Sep 26, 2010 Issue 15 www.nationalyemen.com 9National Yemen BUSINESS

A GIA report says that the investment projects in Yemen has generated 32 billion riyals ($148M USD) in the first half of the current year.

The General Investment Authority (GIA) has granted permits for a number of invest-ment projects during the second quarter of the current year at a cost of more than 19 billion ri-yals ($88M USD), an increase of 7 billion riyals ($32M USD) from the first quarter of this year.

The report issued by the GIA said the industrial sector was the most costly sector for investment projects, as invest-ment capital has reached 7.78 Bn riyals, that is 40% of the to-tal capital invested, created al-most 500 jobs.

The tourism sector came second with an investment capi-tal of almost 6.25 Bn riyals, 31% of the total, generated 426 posts.

The Agricultural sector ranked third with an investment capital of 2.88 Bn, by 14% of the total capital invested, creat-ing 174 additional jobs.

The tertiary services sector came last with an investment capital of only 2.73 Bn riyals, by 14% and 214 work opportu-nities.

The report pointed out that the investment projects record-ed at the GIA for the second quarter of 2010 had been dis-tributed among 13 governor-ates, including the different eco-nomic, service and production sectors, where Hodeida had achieved the highest investment

capital of 34% of the total capi-tal, by 6.58 Bn riyals. The most important projects in Hodeida are two tourist resorts, and a factory for producing fodder.

These projects have created around 311 work opportunities, while Hadramout ranked sec-ond with an invested capital of 4. 471 Bn riyals, by 23%. Among the most important projects in Hadramout for the second quarter are a power sta-tion and a project for transporta-tion of merchandise, equipment and fuels.

The capital secretariat ranked third by 16% of the total invested capital, which is esti-mated at 3.24 Bn, generating 379 work opportunities. Among the most important projects is a project for internal and external land transportation.

Sana’a province ranked fourth by 4% of the total capital invested with 1.675 Bn riyals, providing 88 job opportunities.

Taiz governorate ranked fifth with an investment capital of almost 1.25 Bn with 58 work opportunities. Among the most important investment projects in Taiz is a project for extension of recycled materials.

The investment capital in Aden was 860 million riyals, by 4.4% and of the most important projects in Aden is a project for producing gravel, while the re-maining percentages were dis-tributed among the rest of the provinces: Amran, Shabwah, Marib, Dhamar, Al-Baida, Lahj and Ibb.

Foreign projectsIn relation to the foreign in-

vestment projects recorded at the GIA during the second quar-ter of 2010, the investment capi-tal for this period was 2.08 Bn, by 10.72% of the total invest-ment capital of the second quar-ter that reached 19. 42 Bn riyals.

The report said that Jorda-nian projects came first with an investment capital of 824.48M riyals, by 39% of the foreign in-vestment capital in our country and amongst the major projects is a project for producing fod-der.

The Saudi investments ranked second with an invest-ment capital of 620.28M riyals, by 29% for the project of trans-portation of merchandise, equipment and fuels, followed by the British investments with an invested capital of almost 456.76M, by 21% of the total foreign investment capital in our country for the project of recreational tourist resort.

The Lebanese investments came fourth with a capital of 130 million riyals, by 6%, while the Canadian investments ranked last with 2% of the total foreign investment capital of 50 million riyals.

As per the legal form of the projects recorded for the second quarter of 2010, the report re-vealed that the projects record-ed individually ranked first with an investment capital of 6.32 Bn, by 32% and generating 802 work opportunities, while a lim-ited company came second with 5.54 Bn, by 28% of the invest-ment capital and 264 work op-portunities, followed by an indi-vidual institution with 3.36 Bn

riyals, by 17% and 63 work op-portunities.

A joint-stock company ranked fourth with an invest-ment capital of around 2.78 Bn, by 14%, creating 96 work op-portunities, followed by a com-pany under establishment with 1.27 Bn riyals, by 6%, creating 61 work opportunities. A joint company came last with a capi-tal of 158M riyals, by 0.82% and 20 work opportunities.

The report pointed out that the investment projects record-ed for the first half of the current year 2010 from January to June recorded an investment capital of 32 Bn riyals. The industrial sector ranked first with an in-vestment capital of 14 Bn riyals, by 43%, followed by the tourist sector with 9 Bn riyals, by 29%, while the service sector ranked

third with an invested capital of 5 Bn riyals, by 16% and the ag-ricultural sector came last with an invested capital of around 3 Bn riyals, by 10% of the total investment capital.

As part of the promotion for the various investment opportu-nities in our country, Mr. Salah Al-Attar, Chairman of the GIA, is heading to Germany and Vi-enna at the beginning of Octo-ber on a visit to offer the invest-ment opportunities to businessmen and investors.

Montaha Ali Mothanna, Chairperson of the Promotion Sector in GIA, said that, during the visit, Expo Real Exhibition will be visited. Major European and German Tourist Investment companies are taking part in the exhibition to exhibit the invest-ment features in Yemen in addi-

tion to displaying the new in-vestment law in our country as well as exhibiting the invest-ment product that Yemen has.

She pointed out that a work-shop will be held in the exhibi-tion in Munich. German busi-nessmen will be visiting the exhibition. Also, the chairman of the GIA will hold a TV inter-view with German media, in which he will promote invest-ment opportunities in Yemen.

The chairman of the GIA will also meet Austrian busi-nessmen during his visit to Vi-enna as planned with the Ponu-da organization that follows the UN. He will discuss with them ways of cooperation with the GIA in the field of services of-fered by the GIA to investors.

The government raised the fuel prices on petrol, diesel and kerosene through the circula-tion of a communiqué to all pet-rol stations, last Tuesday, for the third time this year.

The Yemeni Oil Company (YOC) approved raising the price of a liter of petrol to 75 riyals (a 20-litre gallon now costs 1500 riyals [approximate-ly $7 USD]) and a liter of diesel rose from 45 to 50 riyals, (a gal-lon of diesel costs 1000 riyals [approximately $4.5 USD]).

The government approved the first increase in February and the second in May. This in-crease represents a 14% rise for kerosene and 8% for both gaso-line and diesel.

The World Bank has re-cently linked the continuation of offering assistance to Yemen with the implementation of a number of economic reforms,

first of which is implementation of Sales Tax laws, and reducing the substantial government sub-sidies on oil derivatives.

Since the beginning of this year, the government has start-ed gradual lifting of subsidies and began applying the sales tax law and other reforms.

However, Dr. Mohamed Al-Afandi, professor of eco-nomics in Sana’a University, considered these price rises a continuation of the authority’s incorrect policies.

He called instead for can-celling the support paid in the form of oil allocations to influ-ential people who sell what is left of those allocations through smuggling and manipulate the wealth of the country in gener-al.

Al-Afandi said, “These in-creases ensure more poverty, and a remarkable decline of Ye-

meni citizens’ purchasing pow-er, high costs of agricultural production and prices increases in all commodities.”

Estimated state subsidies for oil derivatives in 2009 to-taled between 249 and 397 bil-lion riyals [approx $1.1 – 1.9 Bn USD].

Diesel received the most of the support, a subsidy to the tune of 251%, which came at a cost of about 250 billion riyals [$1.1 Bn USD]. The rest of the support went for gasoline kero-sene and diesel.

The government justified the reasons for the lifting of subsidies that a large portion of diesel is smuggled abroad as a result of price difference be-tween Yemen and neighboring countries, especially in the Horn of Africa.

Investment: 32Bn Riyals in First Half

Third Government Oil Price Rise

Faoud al-Kadi

Mr. Salah Al-Attar - GIA Chairman

Faoud al-Kadi

Sunday, Sep 26, 2010 Issue 15 www.nationalyemen.com10 National YemenHISTORY/SPORT

The Yemeni people in the north of Yemen have lived for a long time under the tyranny of a xenophobic Imamate’s rule. The people lived in complete isola-tion from what was going on regionally, let alone their knowl-edge of what is happening in the wider world.

It was a terrible time of op-pression. The people of North Yemen suffered illiteracy, death from diseases, hunger and ex-treme poverty. The gates of Sana’a, which were surrounded with tightly closed entrances, were closed at seven o’clock in the evening. No one went in or out of the town. The tribes re-siding outside Sana’a were sur-rounded by the soldiers of the Imam under the control of an Imam-appointed governor, who controlled the agriculture and the trade of farmers.

South Yemen however, was under the influence of British colonialism, and had been unit-ed for a long time.

The Imam Yahya Hamid Al-Din followed a policy that alienated the Yemenis in the north and south alike. He did this in agreement with the set-tlers in the south who have wel-comed the policy. Both the Imam and the British settlers were aware that such a scheme would guarantee their continu-ity in their rule in order to pre-serve their own military and trade interests, and the madness of the prevailing hegemony.

They did so by force; in the north by sword, and in the South by modern weapons and an air force of which quelled rebel-lions and uprisings along a coastline which controls one of the most important sea passag-es and ports in the Red Sea.

Perhaps this was a brief in-troduction to discuss the nature of the ruling family of Hamid Al-Din whose injustice and tyr-anny in the north of the country at the time caused the tribes of Yemen, along with the enlight-ened elite, to feel that the situa-tion was unbearable and prompted them to start prepar-

ing for the first attempts of a revolution.

Although these elites were close to the Imam and their liv-ing conditions were good, so to speak, by virtue of their politi-cal leadership and proximity to the Imam Yahya, their convic-tion was that the continued life of the people in that way was more like a living hell.

They subsequently rebelled against the Imam in 1948 but the revolution failed because it lacked good and precise organi-zation and because the people were illiterate and influenced by the backward ideas that the Imamate had nurtured.

When most people heard about the 1948 constitutional revolution, they considered that the word “constitution” is a “heinous crime”. To intimidate the other tribes not to think of any revolutions or movement, the Abbasid Imam Yahya or-dered the tribes near Sana’a to loot Sana’a and violate its sanc-tities under the pretext that the people of Yemen supported the revolution of 1948 to murder his father. This was, in fact, a hei-nous crime perpetrated by a Ha-mid Al-Din royal family mem-ber.

Yet, awareness began to de-

velop, although very limited, in the revolutionary personalities’ minds which led to the rebellion of 1955, which also failed.

The martyr Al-Tholaya was executed in front of everyone to continue intimidation of the people and further instill the idea that the sovereignty of the Imamate rule would last forev-er.

Repeated attempts to change the situation also met with similar success. The rebel-lion of 1959 followed and failed as well. An individual attempt that was carried out by Al-Olofi, Al-Loqayah and Al-Hindwanah to assassinate the Imam Ahmed in Hodeidah hospital also failed. Later, however, the Imam be-came very sick and unable to rule and the people feared him no more.

In reference to the killing of Imam Yahya Hamid Al-Din in 1948, the killing came at the hands of his own men and al-lies, his nephews and in-laws, to implement a legal sentence. The Imam Yahya was sentenced by the Imam Abdullah Al-Wazir, Mr. Hussein Al-Kibsi and oth-ers.

At the same time, Abdullah Bin Ali Al-Wazir, who was as-sociated with the Muslim Broth-

erhood movement in Egypt, ar-rived from Cairo on a British boat to Aden, and then went on to Sana’a to take part in the kill-

ing of the father of his wife Taq-iyah, the Imam Yahya.

The meeting was held in the house of Abdullah Ali Al-Wazir, where an agreement to kill the Imam on the second day of the meeting was reached. Al-Qarda’ee and Al-Husseini were chosen to kill the Imam Yahya.

Despite the failure of revo-lution of 1948, and the death of Imam Yahya, it nonetheless shook the throne of the Imam-ate, which sensed the danger of their demise.

Unfortunately, in spite of the movements of 1955 and 1959, and the assassination at-tempt against the Imam Ahmad in 1961, the tragic situation in Yemen remained the same. Meanwhile however, the Free Officers organization was work-ing in total secrecy to prepare for the revolution.

There were many precur-sors that came prior to the revo-lution. Many factors led to the break-out and victory of the rev-olution of September 26, al-though it was confronted with fierce resistance. The tripartite

aggression against Egypt in 1956 caused wide condemna-tion by Arabs around the world, most especially in Yemen, where the people of Yemen con-demned and denounced the ag-gression. Students in Sana’a staged demonstrations for three consecutive days denouncing the aggression against Egypt.

The Free Officers organiza-tion took advantage of this mo-mentum and directed it against the regime of the Imamate. The fear of the Imamate was palpa-ble, and so imprisoned 11 of these students.

Later, a high level Egyptian delegation paid a visit to Sana’a. The delegation was received by the Imam Al-Badr, who was the heir and Minister of Education. Al-Badr held a reception cere-mony in honor of the Egyptian delegation and delighted and impressed them with shows of culture and sport. After that, the jailed students were released and groups of students were al-lowed to join the police, mili-tary and aviation colleges.

Egyptian officers and non-commissioned officers were called into Yemen to conduct military training. Alongside these efforts, the Egyptian offi-cers were educating college stu-dents about the national spirit. The Free Officers in Egypt in-fused Yemenis with a spirit of revolution and its values.

This prompted the organi-zation of the Free Officers to search for a source of support the continuation and triumph of the revolution after it breaks out. They coordinated actions through the Egyptian charge d’affaires in Yemen at the time and after he got approval from the Egyptian leadership, which confirmed its support for the revolution, Abdel Nasser ful-filled his promise and sent troops to stand by the Yemeni revolution forces.

When the confrontations were intensified by the enemies of the revolution to abort it, the revolution command asked the Egyptian leadership to send ex-

tra troops. The Egyptians de-ployed many reinforcements, which played a major and cru-cial role in supporting the de-fenders of the Yemeni revolu-tion in several fronts controlled by the enemies of the revolu-tion, especially in Sa’ada, Hajj-ah, and some other areas. They made great sacrifices that are re-membered by all Yemenis with pride and thanks.

In 1967, Egypt had to with-draw its troops from Yemen as a result the setback of June in the war with Israel, in defense of their own country. However, the withdrawal affected some areas where the enemies of the revo-lution were stationed.

The Yemeni armed forces, along with the civilian groups which had often received mili-tary training, held their posi-tions and fought fiercely. Many were killed in fierce battles in some difficult places and areas in terms of geographical nature, especially in 1968 and 1969.

The fiercest battles took place, as we noted, in Sa’ada and Hajjah. The September 26 revolution vectored, and its en-emies lost heart in confrontation and realized that the revolution and the Republic were solid and stable.

In 1970 peace prevailed throughout the Republic and work began towards achieving the six principles of the great Yemeni revolution by the suc-cessive leaders who ruled the free democraticYemen, the country of development and in-stitutions in the era of President Ali Abdullah Saleh, President of the Republic.

Today, celebrating the anni-versary of 48th anniversary of September 26 revolution repre-sents a fresh start and renewed building, progress, develop-ment and prosperity in Yemen. Yemen’s re-unification has been achieved and the course of Ye-meni history was freed from all an unsavory past, that of the era of the Imamate and colonialism. It is united forever.

The Yemeni Football As-sociation (YFA) confirmed yesterday that it had received a letter from the European Foot-ball Federation, including the approval of the nomination of three international referees to take part in the management of the Gulf 20 Cup, which will be hosted by Yemen during Nov. 22nd to Dec. 5th, 2010.

The list of referees who have been nominated included: Michael Dean from England, Christian Jacobsen from Ice-land and Alexandru Dan Tudor

from Romania. Michael Leslie Dean (Mike Dean) refereed the 2008 UK Football Association (FA) Cup Final match.

The YFA also received an-other letter from the Asia Fed-eration that included nomina-tion of a Thai referee for membership in the panel of judges of Gulf 20, while previ-ously FIFA had approved ap-pointing the international Al-gerian referee Bel’eed Lakranas Chairman of the pan-el of tournament referees.

Yemenia Airlines, with the participation of Saudi Arabian Airlines, has proceeded with the implementation of a plan to establish an ‘air bridge’ (an Arabic term for shuttle flights) between Sana’a and Aden, and vice versa, for the guests of Gulf 20 to make the guests from the Gulf as comfortable as possible.

Mr. Nabil Al-Faqih, Yemen Minister of Tourism, said, “The Airlines are the official carrier for the tournament and flights will be operated between morn-ing and evening from Aden to Sana’a for those who wish to stay in the capital Sana’a whilst enjoying the Gulf 20 games in Aden.”

Mr. Al-Faqih also respond-ed to rumors that Gulf compa-nies would procure a cruise ship to be harbored in the port of Aden port to host guests. He commented that any prospec-tive plans to launch a ‘floating hotel’ would serve only as a temporary investment.

He said, “If a cruise ship from any company arrives, it’s up to that company. However we would require the ship to

stay away from the port, which will not have room to berth such a vessel during the days of the tournament.”

Al-Faqih proceeded to say that 884 rooms had been pro-vided with the highest specifi-cations to host the participating teams as follows: 230 rooms in the Palace Hotel, 190 rooms in the Aden Hotel, 174 rooms in the Mercure, 120 rooms in Gold Mohur Hotel, and 170 rooms in Core Beach Hotel - all have been furnished accord-ing to the FIFA specifications.”

He also said, “Aden is also home to more than 115 hotels equipped with more than 5000 rooms, and 10,000 beds to re-ceive the incoming masses of people that are expected to ar-rive at more than 30 thousand.”

He also noted that Yemen will host 14 countries to par-ticipate in the Asian Basketball Championship which is hosted by Yemen from 22nd Septem-ber to 1st October. Notably, the Asian Basketball Champion-ship teams outnumber those of Gulf 20.

Ghassan, Sameer and Omar qualify for the eighth round, and Shaima’a ranks first in her category

Yemen’s National Youth Team has qualified for the eighth round of the West Asia Tennis Tournament which is be-ing held in Aleppo (Halab), Syria from the 21st September until the 2nd October. An elite selection of 32 players repre-senting the Arab and Persian countries including: Syria, Ye-men , Kuwait, Iraq, the UAE, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Leba-non and Jordan.

The success is largely due to star Yemeni tennis player, Ghassan Al-Ansi who tri-

umphed in the tournament. He was classified as the first cham-pion in the tournament against the Lebanese player Hadi Habeeb 6/1 – 6/1. He also won against the Jordanian Mosa Hamzah Al-Aswadi 6/3 - 6/1.

Similar successes were echoed by Sameer Sanad won against the Syrian player Adnan Dayar 6/0 – 6/0. Sameer has also won against Jordanian, Al-Aswadi, 6/4- 6/3.

Another Yemeni player, Omer Mohammed, won against Abu Gasem, from Kuwait by 6/1 – 6/4, and also against the player Na’eem, from Lebanon, 6/2 – 6/3.

In the female events, Syrian

player Sausan Jamal, won over-all. Notably she scored victory against the Qatari Ola, 6/2 – 6/1 and subsequently ranked first in her group without any losses.

She became the first female player, out of an original twelve players (who also represented all the same countries), who qualified for the eighth round. The female players competed in three groups of four.

Our national female player is working hard to keep her ti-tle, which she achieved last year from an excellent rung of tour-nament wins.

The Secretary General of the Yemen Federation for Ten-nis, Nabil Mahdi, Chairman of

the delegation, said that “our players have demonstrated ex-cellent technical abilities and are coming first in the tourna-ment, despite the stiff competi-tion from players representing the other countries.”

“They have demonstrated the vigor and readiness which has characterized our team. The early preparations for the tour-nament, which were made through an internal training camp that was held before the tournament, have clearly paid off. They have given our indi-viduals the skills they require to dominate the tournament, and allowed them to become cham-pions.”

Gulf 20 Announces International Referees

Air Bridges, Floating Hotels of Gulf 20

Revolutionary History

Yemen Wins West Asia Tennis Tournament

Fuad Al-Qadi

Taher Hizam

When most people heard about the 1948 constitutional revolution, they considered that the word “constitu-tion” is a “heinous crime”.

‘‘

Sunday, Sep 26, 2010 Issue 15 www.nationalyemen.com 11National Yemen CONGRATULATIONS

National YemenNATIONAL YEMEN VACANCY NOTICE

Role JUNIOR NEWS / NEWS ANALYSIS JOURNALISTS

Number of vacan-cies

Three

Application dead-line

03 October 2010

Start date Immediate

Starting salary $250 USD monthly salary + benefits

Work pattern Full-time (45 hour weeks) / irregular shifts (journalists will be required to travel)

Description The NATIONAL YEMEN (NY) newspaper requires two staff journalists to cover ‘breaking news’ and ‘news analysis’ articles. Journalists must be prepared to travel frequently, and at short no-tice, to provide coverage around Yemen.

Our news journalists will be required to write approximately 1000 words of ‘news’ articles, and 2000 words of ‘news analysis’ articles each week on pre-agreed topics, meeting appropriate deadlines.

Journalists will be required to attend two weekly staff meetings at NY HQ, and also to complete our journalism training packages.

Eligibility We are looking for young, reliable, articulate journalists.

No specific background in journalism is required, as training will be given. This vacancy will be most suitable to recent Yemeni graduates.

Journalists will be expected to be punctual and to meet both our deadlines and our standards. Failure to meet either our deadlines or our high professional standards may result in instant dismissal.

Advanced English language competency is required. Journalists will be expected to be compe-tent computer users.

Incentives In time we will offer an improved salary, commensurate with the journalists’ competency and professional development.

This job is also an excellent opportunity to begin a promising career, and will provide excellent professional training. It also may lead to international coverage of a journalist’s work.

Apply Applicants should send a covering email, their CV, including all contact details, and also a sample of their written work. The written sample should be 800 words long, in a ‘news analysis’ style, on a subject of their choice.

Selection Applicants will be contacted within three days, if they have been successful. The applicant will be expected to attend an assessment day and interview within one week, and will be expected to write a further article, of our choice.

Selected applicants will work for one month on a non-paid probation status after being se-lected. If the trainee journalist meets our deadlines and reaches our standards over the pro-bationary period, they will be fully welcomed to a permanent position with us, with full pay.

National YemenSunday, Sep 26 , 2010 Issue 15 www.nationalyemen.com CONGRATULATIONS