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AMMAN — The State Security Court (SSC) on Monday sentenced a Syrian man to a two-and-a-half year prison term for attempting to smuggle weapons into the country.

Thirty-year-old Ahmad Mahmoud was found guilty of “illegally entering Jordan” and “intent to smuggle weapons” into the country.

According to Islamist sources, Mahmoud was among a known group of smugglers working along the 370-kilometre Jordanian-Syrian border to provide weapons and light military equipment to Islamist militias, namely Al Qaeda-linked Jabhat Al Nusra coalition. 

Monday’s court decision was the latest in a series of prison sentences handed down to jihadists and arms smugglers crossing between the two countries over the past six months.

The decision raised to 42 the total number of suspected jihadists sentenced by the court since late 2013.

More than 2,200 Jordanians are reportedly fighting alongside Islamist militias against Syrian regime forces, the majority of whom are serving under the banner of Al Nusra coalition and its rival, former Al Qaeda affiliate Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant.

In a separate decision on Monday, the SSC sentenced a 20-year-old Jordanian to two-and-a-half years in prison for “illegally crossing into Syria” and committing “acts unauthorised by the state”.

Defence attorney Mousa Abdullat said the Amman resident had gone to the neighbouring country to fight alongside Al Nusra coalition in southern Syria and was arrested by border guards upon his attempt to return to Jordan in February.

AMMAN — Although 11-year-old Diyaa Dweikat has previously written several short stories, his participation in a short story contest that promotes positive thinking and good citizenship has given him inspiration for new themes.

Dweikat’s “The Earthquake”, which won an award, tells the story of two boys who had a friendship-ending fight over a basketball game and were punished by an earthquake that separated them. 

Realising the importance of their friendship and their need for each other, the boys then wished for a reunion and were rewarded by another earthquake that reunited them.

“I am very happy that I won,” he told The Jordan Times on Sunday after receiving an award in the Heik A7la (it’s better this way) initiative’s short story and photography competition.

“The Earthquake” was one of 97 contributions submitted to the competition, which aimed to boost the initiative’s goals in promoting positive thinking through arts and music, in addition to 27 photographs for the photography contest. 

Speaking at the award ceremony, Heik A7la founder Marlene Al Atrash Abdallah said the initiative seeks to “boost young people’s self-confidence and have them believe in their potentials”.

She noted that the competition received entries from Jordan, Morocco, Palestine, Egypt and Iraq, which means that positive thinking is not limited by borders. 

Samer Khair, executive director of culture at the Greater Amman Municipality (GAM), who was deputising for Amman Mayor Aqel Biltaji, noted that GAM supports Heik A7la because the goals of the initiative correspond with the municipality’s recently released motto “Our Mother Amman”, which considers the city a mother to all residents.

“This initiative seeks to boost positivity towards the city of Amman and among Ammanis themselves,” he told the audience at Al Hussein Cultural Centre.

“In our partnership with Heik A7la, we hope to enhance the community’s positive attitudes towards laws and regulations, in addition to respecting pluralism and differences among inhabitants of the city,” Khair added.

In addition to spreading the themes of tolerance, dialogue and social responsibility, Heik A7la seeks to increase the integration of people with disabilities into society.

Amaal Zaamout, a member of a club for the deaf community in Jordan, highlighted, through sign language, Heik A7la’s role in making schools for deaf students better and more interesting for learning by painting murals on the walls.

Zaamout expressed hope that everyone would learn sign language to communicate directly with deaf people and integrate them into society.

The ceremony included a number of vocal performances by the Nai Choir and students of Sifaa Bint Aouf School, in addition to a dance performance by Studio8.

Besides Dweikat, Shaimaa Ababneh, Ruaa Tawara, Leen Abu Shaker and Wafaa Shammout won awards in the Arabic short story contest in the 8-12 year age group, while awards for 13-16 year olds in the same category went to Alaa Shawi and Hiba Janbeik.

Meanwhile, Natalie Sahawneh, Natalie Samawi and Rachel Rodriguez won awards for their stories in English in the 8-12 age gtoup, and Lina Mustafa was the winner in the 13-16 segment.

The awards for the photography competition went to Mirvat Nouri, Alaa Hamdan, and Nada Mahrous.

The ceremony included an exhibition of some of the submitted photographs.

AMMAN –– The Greater Amman Municipality, together with the public security and gendarmerie departments led a security crackdown targeting street vendors in downtown Amman on Monday.  

The campaign was aimed at seizing weapons like knives and confiscating drugs, according to Ahmad Ebbini, director of the GAM department to regulate street vendors. 

“We seized 400 weapons and around 15 people were arrested. I can say that this is the most successful campaign ever,” Ebbini told The Jordan Times over the phone on Monday, noting that the detainees were referred to the governor.  

“We will continue to refer illegal street vendors to the governor to deter others from selling illegal items and breaking the law,” he said. 

“In the past, we used to confiscate the goods which did not stop them from coming back,” Ebbini added. 

He noted that there are still a number of street vendors selling their goods and GAM is going to intensify its campaign during the next few days. 

“We will conduct an intensive crackdown this month and in June.”

The municipality official said GAM has the option of bringing street vendors together in one location to enable them to sell their goods, but they are averse to the idea. 

“They believe that the location they are working in is better than the site we will propose,” Ebbini added. 

AMMAN — Adoption of cyber security strategies in the region will boost the utilisation of cloud computing, which remains “modest” across Arab states, a Microsoft expert said Monday.

Increased awareness among Arab governments and the private sector is crucial to increase adoption of the technology, which can help save millions of dollars annually, said Ashraf Abdel Wahab, corporate affairs manager for Egypt and North Africa at Microsoft. 

“Arab countries are very late when it comes to adopting cloud computing,” Abdel Wahab noted at a roundtable.

“The technology can significantly help reduce budgets that companies and governments spend annually on IT-related expenses,” he said. 

Cloud computing includes the practice of using a network of remote servers hosted on the Internet to store, manage and process data, rather than a local server or personal computer.

Web-based computing helps businesses reduce IT spending, focus on innovation and enhance employees’ productivity, especially if they are allowed to use their own devices for accessing work-related databases, according to experts.

The adoption of cloud computing will increase the need for experts in certain IT fields such as network management and security, which will play a key role in creating jobs, Abdel Wahab noted.

“The Middle East and Africa is one of the main regions in the world where there is a huge consumption of data, which makes it necessary to resort to cloud computing,” he added.

The more the technology is utilised, the more jobs will be created, he said, adding that academia should focus on equipping IT students with skills that are relevant to data management and security. 

The Microsoft executive stressed that small- and medium-sized enterprises can benefit from cloud computing, as it lowers IT infrastructure expenditures.

“It is important to raise awareness among governments in the region on the benefits of cloud computing, as they can play a role in its adoption in the private sector,” Abdel Wahab said.

AMMAN — Jordanian and German archaeologists convened in the capital on Monday to discuss ways of protecting the region’s cultural heritage amid the wave of revolts, regime changes and ongoing civil wars that marked the situation of Arab Spring countries since 2010.

During the two-day meeting, titled “Preserving the Past — Constructing the Future, Cultural Heritage and Social Development in the Arab World”, experts will discuss current political, economic and social issues linked to the preservation of historical sites in the Arab world.

“This is a particularly poignant time in which to consider the preservation of our cultural and archaeological heritage,” HRH Princess Sumaya told the audience attending the opening ceremony. “For as the humanitarian crisis across our not distant border continues to take a terrible toll on our shared human heritage...  We must determine to redouble our efforts in preservation.” 

“For what is happening today in Syria may happen more slowly but inexorably in other countries in time of peace, unless we are up to preserving our heritage,” the princess added.

Vulnerability of sites in phases of violent upheaval, threats to historic buildings in times of rapidly growing urban centres, and the balance between touristic use and conservation requirements are among the topics experts will touch upon in the conference.

Princess Sumaya said that since the region’s cultural heritage stands as a non-renewable resource, no one should underestimate the urgency of acting now to save its material heritage.

“As we all share common anxieties over our threatened environment, our dwindling resources and reckless population growth, we should remember that even the greatest civilisation may fall to the ravages of climate, conflict and economic greed. Discovering the secrets of the past may help us live in harmony with our environment and indeed with each other,” she said.

The conference, organised by the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD), is taking place within a celebration dubbed “German Weeks”, which brings together German institutions, organisations and companies active in the Kingdom.

Princess Sumaya, deputy chairman of the Jordan Museum board of trustees, inaugurated the May 11-23 event on Sunday.

DAAD President Margret Wintermantel stressed her country’s commitment in academic education in archaeology and related fields in the Arab world during the conference’s opening ceremony.

“We are convinced that cooperation between German and Arab universities brings benefits to both sides,” Wintermantel said, highlighting the “tremendous” importance of cultural heritage for a country’s identity, and also as an economic factor since tourism is a significant income generation source.

German Ambassador to Jordan Ralph Tarraf praised the role of Jordan amid the Syrian crisis, which started as a peaceful protest movement and turned into a civil war in which over 160,000 people have died.

“Jordan has become the hub of security in the Levant not only inside its borders but also projecting security into the whole sub-region which is quite a remarkable achievement for a country of the size and volume of Jordan,” Tarraf said.

“Syria has become the open wound of the region with destabilising effects on Lebanon and Iraq, and posing a huge burden on Turkey and Jordan. These developments are directly endangering the cultural heritage of the region.” 

The envoy stressed that the current political and economic arrangements to preserve the security of Jordan should be sustained in the future. 

“Constructing the future and preserving the future is the most urgent and pressing need as soon as we think beyond the current crisis mode. We are here to see and discuss how the cultural heritage can contribute to construct the future.”

AMMAN — The Ministry of Labour will not extend the grace period given to illegal guest workers to rectify their status and obtain work and residency permits, according to a government official.

The grace period, which started on March 16, will end on Wednesday, Ibrahim Saudi, Labour Ministry assistant secretary general and head of its guest workers department, said.

“Wednesday is the last day of the grace period and there are no intentions of extending it for any reason whatsoever.”

"The grace period was sufficient and planned in accordance with the concerned embassies in Amman,” Saudi added.

He noted that the Ministry of Labour has issued 79,000 work permits over the past month; 70 per cent of them were for Egyptian guest workers.

The permits were issued during the grace period for illegal guest workers to rectify their situation and renew their documents, according to the ministry, which has collected JD20 million in fees for the work permits.

Saudi underscored that the ministry will launch a nationwide crackdown on illegal guest workers in cooperation with security forces on May 18, highlighting that inspection teams will be increased to 50, and that they will start work at 8am and finish at 10pm.

Illegal guest workers who fail to rectify their status during the grace period will be sent back to their countries in cooperation with their embassies, according to the ministry.

According to Saudi, the ministry is planning to adopt a new system for work permits, under which issuance fees will increase at varying rates for certain sectors.

AMMAN — Finance Ministry Secretary General Omar Zu’bi on Sunday described the budget performance as encouraging, saying the Treasury will receive hundreds of millions during this year in grants and low-interest loans.

In an interview with The Jordan Times on the sidelines of a high-profile regional conference to discuss policies that can generate jobs and lead to better growth and equity in the region, Zu’bi explained that the Finance Ministry is scheduled to launch the second US-guaranteed $1 billion Eurobonds by the end of June in international financial markets.

He said that the interest rates on the sovereign bonds are likely to be lower or around the 2.5 per cent interest rates the bond issuance carried in October last year.

He said that the budget is also set to receive next week the Macro-Financial Assistance soft loan from the European Union, which is worth 180 million euros (JD177 million). 

The agreement of the medium-term loan was signed by the government and the EU in Brussels mid-April. 

Indicating that the government has recently received $264.7 million from the International Monetary Fund under a three-year programme supported by a Stand-By Arrangement, the official pointed out that the government is expecting to receive $250 million from the World Bank in the form of a soft loan to support the Kingdom’s budget and another $120 million from Japan in a long-term, low-interest loan.

Zu’bi said that Jordan will receive around $1 billion in financial and economic assistance from the US late this year. 

“The short-term fiscal conditions are promising as we feel comfortable with the volumes of grants and cheap lending we expect to receive this year,” the official said, expressing hope that the budget deficit will be lower than the JD1.1 billion projected by the government. 

Zu’bi said that measures to control spending and raise domestic revenues will help improve the budget performance. 

Domestic revenues are picking up to exceed the government forecast for this year, he added.   

AMMAN — The first Franco-Jordanian Forum on Renewable Energy is scheduled to be held on Wednesday and Thursday in Amman, according to a statement released by the organisers.

A delegation of 12 “prominent French companies” working in the field of renewable energy will be attending the forum along with the French Syndicate for Renewable Energy (SER) and the Mediterranean Institute for Renewable Energy.

The forum — organised by the Franco-Jordanian Business Club in cooperation with the French embassy, the Jordan Investment Board, SER and the French Agency for Development — will be held in the presence of “internationally renowned speakers and experts” in the field of energy along with government officials from both Jordan and France, the statement said.

AMMAN — The EU and the International Organisation for Migration delivered over 23 vehicles to the border guards to transport Syrian refugees from the border to camps as part of an EU-funded project to help Jordanian authorities cope with the impact of the Syrian crisis.

The handover ceremony was held at the border guards’ Zarqa headquarters, an EU statement said.

The vehicles, which include six large buses, six minibuses, eight pickup trucks and three ambulances, will assist border guards in dealing with the influx of refugees.

AMMAN — The National Building Initiative (Zamzam) organised a seminar on Sunday on the Elections Law and reform priorities.

Participants — who included MPs, activists and political party representatives — called for drafting a new elections law that safeguards the democratic process and produces a parliament based on national programmes rather than narrow loyalties.