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AMMAN — Four people were injured on Thursday in a road accident in Amman, the Jordan News Agency, Petra, quoted the Civil Defence Department (CDD) as saying.

The two-vehicle collision occurred in Dabouq, where west Amman CDD cadres administered first aid to the injured and took them to Al Hussein Medical City. They were listed in fair condition.

AMMAN — The Jordan Food and Drug Administration (JFDA) on Thursday warned the public from using a product called “Easy Slim”. The item is promoted through social media websites as a natural product for weight loss, the Jordan News Agency, Petra, reported.

The administration said the product is not authorised for sale in the local market, warning of its dangerous side effects. The JFDA urged consumers not to fall for misleading ads and to file complaints and notes to 080022660 or through WhatsApp on 00962798245475 to check the safety of any products in the market.

AMMAN — The sixth cycle of the Civil Service Development Programme concluded recently, according to a statement from the British embassy. British Ambassador to Jordan Edward Oakden hosted a reception on Wednesday to celebrate the conclusion.

The programme is run by the King Abdullah II Fund for Development (KAFD) as one of its leadership programmes, aiming to enhance policy making and management capabilities of leaders from government entities, the private sector and local NGOs, the statement said.

The programme benefits from a partnership between the KAFD and Inspirational Development Group (IDG) with a 15-year-long partnering agreement with the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst in the UK. Over 140 Jordanian leaders have benefited from the programme since it was instituted in 2009.

AMMAN — The Jordan Hashemite Charity Organisation (JHCO) on Thursday received eight amputee children from Gaza, who will be travelling to Slovenia for medical treatment.

JHCO Secretary General Ayman Mifleh said the children’s arrival in Jordan has been facilitated in accordance with His Majesty King Abdullah’s directives.

The rehabilitation programme targets 100 children from Gaza, with the aim of providing them with prosthetics, the Jordan News Agency, Petra, reported.

AMMAN — Yousef Bataineh on Thursday presented his credentials to King Harald V of Norway as Jordan’s nonresident ambassador to the Nordic kingdom.

At the ceremony, Bataineh conveyed His Majesty King Abdullah’s greetings to King Harald V and the Norwegian people, the Jordan News Agency, Petra, reported.

King Harald V voiced his appreciation for Jordan’s role in supporting regional and international peace and security.

He also praised the Jordanian humanitarian role in hosting refugees, highlighting the need to assist the Kingdom in this regard, Petra added.

AMMAN — Four suspects in possession of 250 small bags of synthetic cannabis (locally known as “joker”) and firearms have been arrested in central Amman, the Public Security Department’s (PSD) media centre said Thursday.

A Criminal Investigation Department (CID) patrol on duty in the Hashemi area noticed an individual disembarking from a car and roaming around the area in a “suspicious” manner, said a PSD statement carried by the Jordan News Agency, Petra. 

When approached, he and other suspects drove away in the same vehicle, according to the PSD.

A police chase followed during which the suspects shot at the patrol and escaped.

The CID officers took the vehicle’s licence plate number and issued an all-points bulletin to other patrols in the area. 

The vehicle’s owner and his home address were identified, and he was brought to the police station where he claimed his
car had been stolen.

After further questioning, he confessed that he had been in the car at the time it was spotted by the CID, and that his friend was the man seen by the officers.

The location of the other suspects was identified and a team raided and searched the apartment after obtaining a warrant. 

Two suspects attempted to escape by jumping from the second-floor flat, but they were apprehended and one who was injured was taken to Al Bashir Hospital for treatment.

The suspects and their possessions were referred to court for legal action, Petra reported.

AMMAN — The Cassation Court has upheld a March Criminal Court ruling referring a man to a psychiatric institution after finding him partially not responsible of murdering two men in September 2011.

The defendant was convicted of shooting to death Salem Eid, 81, and his son Saleh, 45, with an automatic weapon.

The court said four months before the incident, the defendant’s father died during a visit to the victims’ house.

“The defendant, who suffered from mental illness (psychosis), believed that the victims poisoned his father over a land dispute and he decided to kill them in revenge,” the Criminal Court added.

On September 11, 2011, the defendant headed to the victims’ home armed with an assault rifle and shot and killed them.

He fled from the scene and was later arrested by police, who found an automatic weapon in his possession, according to court transcripts.

A ballistics test at the crime lab confirmed that the bullets were fired from the weapon found on the defendant, the court added.

The Criminal Court decided in March to change the original charge of premeditated murder to manslaughter and declared the defendant partially not responsible for his actions since he suffered from psychosis.

“It was evident to us from the findings of government physicians that the defendant suffered from psychosis when he committed the murders and is still suffering from psychosis and unaware of his actions; therefore, he should remain at a mental institution until he is no longer a threat to society,” the court ruled.

Psychosis occurs when a person loses contact with reality. The person may have false beliefs about what is taking place, or who one is (delusions) or see or hear things that are not there (hallucinations), according to the US national Library for Medicine. 

However, the attorney general appealed the verdict demanding a tougher punishment for the defendant.

But the Cassation Court upheld the Criminal Court’s ruling, saying it falls within the law and that the proceedings were proper and the sentence the defendant received is satisfactory.

The Cassation Court tribunal comprised judges Mahmoud Ababneh, Basel Abu Anzeh, Yassin Abdullat, Mohammad Tarawneh and Basem Mubeidin.

AMMAN — Veteran statesman and renowned economist Jawad Anani, originally planned to study engineering in the US but returned to the Kingdom with a degree in economics.

"I was enrolled in an engineering programme at the University of Southern California. It was there that I took three compulsory economics courses and was subsequently advised by one of my professors to study economics," the former Royal Court chief told The Jordan Times in a recent interview. 

"One of my professors, Robert Mundell, kept advising me to switch to economics, telling me that I am an economist by nature."

At first, Anani did not listen to his Nobel Prize winning professor. 

But it was only "in the third semester, [when] I took another course with him and he kept pushing, that I switched to economics".

After two years, and as a result of Mundell's advice, Anani quit engineering at the University of Southern California to study economics at the American University in Cairo (AUC). 

The choice of school was based upon his father's insistence that "if you want to study economics, it has to be in the Arab world."

In 1967, Anani obtained his bachelor's degree in economics from the AUC. 

He went on to pursue, and achieve, a master's degree in economics from Vanderbilt University (Nashville, Tennessee) in 1970, and a PhD from the University of Georgia in 1975.

Anani, now a senator, said he dedicated himself to science at an early age. 

"I love to learn. Reading is in my blood," he said.

"My father taught me the love of knowledge. He was an English language teacher, radio presenter, historian, writer and playwright. I was raised in a house where reading was a must. 

"There was fierce competition among us, six brothers and two sisters, over who achieved the most at school. My father was our mentor and a relentless learner and teacher."

Anani noted that the "press element" of his character was also built into him by his father: "He was a radio presenter for Near East Radio in Ramallah and he also worked in Jerusalem. After the [1955] unification of the East and West Banks, my father moved to Amman where he worked at Jordan Radio as a presenter and producer, in addition to teaching English."

Anani, who has served as minister of labour, trade and tourism, now writes for several newspapers such as The Jordan Times, Al Rai, Al Ghad and Ad-Dustour.

A proud father of five, Anani insists that he "never interfered in [his] children's academic preferences".

Instead, his children have studied a wide range of subjects — business administration, law, pharmacy, computer science and cinema production.

Anani also served as a senior member of Jordan's delegation to the 1991 Madrid Peace Conference, minister of state for prime ministry and media affairs in 1993 and deputy prime minister and foreign minister in 1997.

In 2012 he was appointed as president of the Social and Economic Council, a position he held until he became a senator in 2013.

Anani has also worked in the private sector both inside and outside Jordan, and served on the boards of over 40 companies, one of which he owned in Dubai.

"Regardless of all the senior posts I have held, I never forgot that I am an economist — publishing research papers inside and outside Jordan. I also taught economics in Jordan and the Gulf. It is what I am best at."

When asked about his plans for the future, the senator said he has always wished to establish a university, and in fact he is making that dream come true.

"I am now working on building a university in Aqaba."

AMMAN — Since its establishment 40 years ago, The Jordan Times has been a "women-heavy" institution that puts gender equality policies into practice, according to current and former female JT leaders.

Women have always been an "essential ingredient of the newspaper's colourful and pluralistic" fabric, one that united free-minded employees from different social classes, religions and cultures, said Rana Sabbagh, former JT reporter and chief editor (1999-January 2002).

Sabbagh, who is currently the executive director of Arab Reporters for Investigative Journalism, was the first of two female chief editors at JT, with the second being the late Jennifer Hamarneh (2002-2007).

Many of the paper's female staff members gained professional expertise that enabled them to "land in bigger places", Sabbagh said, citing Rana Sweis (The New York Times), Suha Maayeh (The Wall Street Journal and Time Magazine) as examples of JT reporters who moved on to leading international media institutions.

Reflecting back on her first encounter with journalism as a JT reporter in 1984, the veteran journalist recalls how editors used to ask her to rewrite some of her stories.

"We learned to work hard to prove ourselves," she told The Jordan Times, adding that the late P.V. Vivekanand, who was senior editor at the time, would spend over two hours with her editing a story.

Sabbagh left The JT, which she describes as a safe haven that taught her integrity and professionalism, in 1987 to work for Reuters, with her articles featured in several local, regional and international media outlets.

With a rich professional experience, she returned to "give back to the JT" as a managing editor and later as chief editor, but her journey at the daily, which turned 40 on Tuesday, ended due to what she called a clash between her journalistic ethics and the government's political agenda at the time.

Equality

The newspaper maintained a professional environment that treated employees based on merit, according to managing editor Ica Wahbeh, who joined the newspaper some 26 years ago.

Wahbeh, who edits the opinion pages, said all employees were treated equally. 

"At the JT, editors-in-chief, without fail, would be supportive, but again, based on merit, not on gender," she added.

"The support we needed was from our families, which had to put up with our ungodly hours, but professionally, [the JT] was a good place to be in."

Female employees at The JT, she noted, always exceeded or were similar to the number of male staff members.

For Rana Husseini, an award-winning JT journalist and a women's rights activist for over 22 years, her experience at the paper has enabled her to become a keynote speaker and trainer in the field, and inspired her to write a book on so-called honour crimes.

"The Jordan Times was the first newspaper to adopt a campaign against so-called honour crimes… if it hadn't been for the open policy of the newspaper and the encouragement, I would not have written a book, I would not have been invited to talk everywhere on this issue," she said.

The book, "Murder in the Name of Honor", includes stories Husseini compiled while covering the crime beat for The JT.

"I always got support from my editors-in-chief, editors and colleagues regarding my work in general and regarding women's rights," she said, adding that everybody who took the helm of The JT believed in human rights.

Similar to Husseini, several women leading social change have worked at The JT, according to Nermeen Murad, who was a reporter at the newspaper between 1984 and 1995 and a columnist from 2006 to 2012.

As a paper that believes in multiplicity, The JT has provided female columnists and political thinkers with the space for self expression and exposure to public space, Murad added.

Speaking from the perspective of a former reporter, she said the newspaper's environment had an integral role in encouraging women employees to flourish at a time when journalism was a controversial job for females.

Murad, who is currently leading the first Jordanian Gender Programme funded through USAID and implemented by IREX, highlighted The JT as a newspaper sensitive to issues facing women, depicted at "an intellectual level".

"The Jordan Times needs to continue doing so… Women still need The JT to be sensitive to their issues and to give them the voice they need to express themselves."

AMMAN — Senate President Faisal Fayez on Thursday received Transparency International Director General Cobus de Swardt and his accompanying delegation who are currently visiting the Kingdom to take part in the 10th Government Leaders Forum, slated for Saturday.

Fayez commended Transparency International’s efforts in combating corruption in the world, stressing the importance of benefiting from the agency’s expertise, the Jordan News Agency, Petra, reported.

Fayez highlighted the Kingdom’s interest in improving its ranking on Transparency International’s reports. For his part, De Swardt commended Jordan’s stability and security amidst a turbulent region, reviewing his agency’s role in combating corruption.